Life in a Glass House
by maddengirl
Summary: Name: Gabriella Montez.Age: 16.Ambition: To get her brothers out of her personal life and never give Troy Bolton the satisfaction of always getting what he wants. AU
1. So what is your thing?

**Name:** _Gabriella Montez_

**Age:** _16_

**Dating:** _If her brothers have their way, not until she's 35._

**Status:** _Single, smart, and annoyed._

**Ambition:** _To get her brothers out of her personal life and never give Troy Bolton the satisfaction of always getting what he wants._

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 1: So what is your thing?**

Gabriella slammed the door as she barged into the house. She ignored every voice that threw a comment at her and marched up the stairs, only to stop at her bedroom door. "If anyone else feels the need to involve themselves in my social life, I'll be in my room for the rest of eternity!" her scream rang through the house. Gabriella's door crashed into its frame and she perched herself on top of her bed. Barely a minute later had a light knock come at her door. "Whoever it is, go away." She said stubbornly.

"It's Mom." Her mother said through the door.

Gabriella grabbed a pillow and held it close to her. "You can come in." she muttered.

Her mom quietly let herself in and sat at the foot of her daughter's bed. "What happened sweetie?"

"What do you think happened? They happened!" Gabriella exclaimed.

Her mom lightly smiled. "Honey I'm going to need a little more information."

Gabriella let out a heavy sigh. "I was at The Den with this guy Zach from school and we were just talking and all of sudden Cole, Luke, and Kevin happen." She hugged her pillow tighter.

Gabriella's mom rubbed her daughter's leg to comforter her. "I'm sorry, but that's just the price you have to pay when you have brothers."

"But every time a guy seems remotely interested in me they come and mess it up! It's like the take turns and keep track of how soon they can make a guy go away."

"Oh, now it's not that bad."

Gabriella's eyes perked up. "Oh really? Let's look at the past six guys that have asked me out; none of which have ever talked to me again." She told her mother. "There was Cody who was turned away by Trevor and Jason; then there was Jacob who was turned away by Scott and Ian; then Joel and Adam were threatened by Dad; and last we have Garret and Zach who were both scared away by Cole, Luke, and Kevin."

Her mom opened her mouth to console her daughter but was abruptly cut off by a loud crash followed by a stream of yelling and blame. "Honey, can we finish this conversation later?"

Gabriella swung her arm to show her mom out the door. She watched her mom scurry out the door and heard her footsteps travel down the stairs.

"What did ya'll break this time?" she heard her mother yell. "And what did I tell you boys about playing ball in the house?"

Gabriella couldn't help but smile as she heard her mom hand out punishments to her brothers. This was one of the times that she enjoyed being the only girl. Her happy thoughts were soon interrupted by the phone's ring.

"I got it!" she yelled to the rest of the house, doubting anyone heard her. "Hello?"

"Why hello there." Answered back.

"Hey Chad. How's life as an only child?" Gabriella asked as she pouted on her bed.

She heard Chad laugh. "I saw what happened at The Den…"

"And you still wonder why I gripe about my brothers so much."

"Look I know you hate it when your brothers interfere, but I get where they're are coming from. They are just trying to look out for you."

Gabriella snorted a laugh at his statement. "You sound like my mom."

"Well your mom does have a little somethin, somethin, going on…"

"Eww! Chad, that's my mom your talking about!" she heard him laugh on the other line. "And don't you have a girlfriend, a.k.a. my best friend."

"Ah, yes. The lovely Taylor; and the reason I'm calling. Our six month anniversary is in a few days and…"

"You have no idea what to get her." Gabriella finished for her friend. "One of these days you're going to have to pick out a present for her by yourself."

"Please don't let that day be today because I am totally lost. I mean I know what she likes but I can't seem to buy the right thing. It's like a curse I have. I just suck at buying presents. Remember what I got you for your last birthday? I got you one of those 20 Questions games. For your sixteenth birthday. I mean who does that?"

"Shhh!" Gabriella ordered as she slowly walked out her room and tip toed across the hall. "Did you hear that?"

"Me rambling on about how I buy lame presents?"

"No." Gabriella reached a door splattered with exploded paintballs and stickers of sports. She ripped open the door to find two young boys sitting in the middle of the room with a phone held between their heads. "Ian! Jason! This is a private conversation!" she yelled at her youngest brothers.

"Doesn't sound so private to me!" the blonde haired Ian yelled back at her.

"Well it is." She spat out. "And aren't you two supposed to be grounded or sent off to military school by now?"

"Mom only grounded Cole and Luke because they were supposed to be watching us." Ian announced happily.

"So we can listen to your phone conversations all we want!" Jason added.

Gabriella screeched and lunged at her brothers, but they dodged her grip and ran out of the room. She fell on the floor and stared at the empty, smelly room in defeat.

"Gabriella? Gabster? My Gabi Girl?" she heard sing through the receiver.

Gabriella hastily held the phone back up to her ear. "I'll meet you at the food court in twenty minutes." She told him before clicking the phone off.

She marched herself downstairs, determined to get out of the house without another yelling match with one of her brothers. "Mom, can I go the mall?" her question drew the attention of everyone in the kitchen.

"With who?" her father questioned sternly.

"Of course sweetie." Her mom told her. "Scott, drive your sister to the mall."

"If Scott gets to go I'm going!" Kevin announced to his family.

"No." Gabriella said quickly. "I'll just take the bus." As she excited the kitchen and made her way to the front door she heard complaints coming from most of her brothers and her father. Again, they managed to put a smile on her face.

--------------------

"Gabi you are my lifesaver!" Chad exclaimed as they left yet another store. "This gift is perfect!"

"I know." Gabriella agreed. "That's why I picked it out." She smiled up at Chad.

He looked down at her. "Oh that one boy will be very very lucky."

Gabriella rolled her eyes. "If my brothers have their way, there won't be a lucky boy."

Chad laughed and opened his mouth to say something back to Gabriella.

"Chad!" both spun around to see who hollered at him. "Don't you have a girlfriend whose well, not her?"

Gabriella watched the boy approach them. She recognized him from school. A basketball player; on the team with Chad and Luke. He strode over to them wearing an East High, color coordinated track suit.

"Hey Troy." Chad slapped hands with the other boy. "You met Gabriella?"

Gabriella locked eyes with him. She saw his eyes travel up and down her frame. She shifted uncomfortably, but tried not to let it faze her.

"No." he said smirking. "I'm Troy." He stuck out his hand,

She politely shook his hand. "Gabriella." She knew his kind. She lived with seven of his kind. And she was too smart to be fooled into love by those blue eyes like the rest of the girls in school. Oh no, she had seen too many heartbreaks given out by her very own flesh and blood to become one of the many.

She stood next to Chad and listened to them drone on about basketball practices, games, and they're chances of making it to state this year. A conversation she had heard repeated day in and day out.

"Hey Chad, I got to get home for dinner." Gabriella said, daring to interrupt their conversation.

Chad glanced at the three watches that were fastened on his wrist. "Oh geez! Me too. I can't miss meatloaf night." He exclaimed. "Troy I'll see you at school tomorrow." He nodded towards his friend before turning his attention to the girl next to him. "I'll talk to you later, Gabs."

Chad made a quick dash through the shopping center to his car leaving Gabriella alone with Troy. Not having any desire to talk to the basketball player, she turned around making her way towards the door.

"Hey Gabriella, wait up!" she heard footsteps running towards her.

Bracing herself, she turned around to meet Troy. "Yeah?"

"How are you getting home?" he questioned.

"The bus." She told him simply.

Troy glanced past Gabriella. "Looks like you just missed it."

Gabriella spun around just in time to see her bus leave. "Then I guess I'm walking." She told him before continuing her walk outside.

Troy ran after her and grabbed her arm. "Let me drive you home."

"Thanks, but no thanks."

But Troy kept a grip on her arm. "Come on. It's just a ride."

Gabriella looked at him. His face was soft, his eyes were pure, but she knew that he was anything but a good boy.

"Fine." She agreed, causing a smile to spread across Troy's face.

Five minutes later they were in his car with Gabriella pointing the directions to her house.

"So if you're friends with Chad you must know Taylor." He said, trying to start a conversation.

"She's my best friend." Gabriella told him.

Troy's hand rested on the gear shift, just inches away from Gabriella's leg. "So are you a nerd like her?"

Gabriella shook her head, straining herself from saying anything that could possibly come back to bite her.

"Sorry. I guess that the East High stereotyping really isn't your thing."

"Aren't you smart."

"So what is your thing?" he asked.

"Look, I have enough brothers to know what you're trying to do." Gabriella told him. "And it's not going to work."

"Really?" Troy pondered with a smirk. "How many brothers do you have?"

"Seven." She told him shortly.

"Any go to East High?"

"Three." She said. "And you probably know Luke. He's on the team with you."

Troy laughed. "Yeah, I know him. But I didn't know that he had a sister, or six brothers."

"You learn something new everyday, don't you?"

"So how old are all of them?" Troy asked, ignoring Gabriella's comment.

Gabriella took a deep breath. "Trevor is 21, Scott is 19, Cole and Luke are 17, Kevin is 14, Ian is 11, and Jason is 10."

"And how old are you?"

Gabriella turned to face him. "16."

Troy smiled. "A junior. Like me."

"And look at that, it's my house." Gabriella said, crawling out of the car.

"Hey Gabriella!" Troy called after her. She turned to face him again. "I'll see you later." He said with a wink and drove off.

Gabriella watched his car drive away in amazement. "As if I haven't had enough guy problems for one day."

She walked through her front door to be bombarded with questions.

"Who was that?" Scott questioned.

"Good evening to you too." She smirked at the sea of boys surrounding her,

"Answer the question Gabriella."

"Stop budding into my life Scott." She said, pressing past her brothers.

"You weren't out with Chad were you?" he accused following her into the kitchen. "You went out on a date."

"Look!" she spun around. "Just because you guys don't trust any guy that gets within a 3 mile radius of me doesn't me that you have the right to interrogate me after I hang out with a friend."

Her brothers stared at their sister. "So you were out with Chad?" Cole asked.

"Yeah." Her brothers all nodded in improvement and took their seats at the table. "And why do you guys let me hang out with Chad anyway?"

"He's dating Taylor." Luke said as he shoved in a roll.

"And he wouldn't do anything to mess that up." Cole added.

Gabriella rolled her eyes and too her seat at the table. She watched her family attack the food on the table and pile it onto their plates. Part of her wanted to tell her brothers that it was Troy Bolton who drive her home and watch them interrogate him and scare him away. But the other part, the part that won out, wanted to see how far she could take this. How long could Troy Bolton be associated with her before anything could happen?

* * *

**Well, there is my new story! I know it has a lot of information in it, but I hope you guys all enjoyed this first chapter. Please, please, please review it. I want to know if I should continue with it or just cut my losses.**

**And for those of you reading _Crash Into You,_ I will still be updating that regularly.**

**And for those of you who haven't read _Crash Into You_, you should :) I really love writing that story.**


	2. Maybe she’s PMSing?

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 2: Maybe she's PMSing?**

Gabriella walked into East High with her best friend by her side. The halls were newly decorated with posters advertising the week's events; including the basketball game which Gabriella would be forced to attend, yet again.

"Why can't my brothers just be normal and ignore me?" she complained as they walked past the cheerleaders who were showing off their newly purchased shoes. "I mean, why do they have to treat me like I can't handle myself?" she asked looking around at the passing students. "Why can't they be like Ryan? He's Sharpay's twin and he could care less who she dates."

Taylor and Gabriella watched Sharpay pass them with a football player trialing her, carrying her books. "Sharpay and Ryan aren't exactly normal people." Taylor told her. "They are Drama Clubers. They're special."

"Taylor, you know how much I hate stereotypes."

"And you know that in some cases they are true." Taylor told her. "Like with Troy Bolton. The basketball player who does whatever it takes to get into a girl's pants."

Gabriella laughed. "Okay, sometimes they're true." She said as she watched a group of basketball players, led by Troy, walked down the hall. As they passed the two girls Troy gave Gabriella a wink and a hello.

Taylor's mouth dropped. "Oh my gosh! Why didn't you tell me you knew Troy Bolton? And knew him enough for him to say 'hi' to you in the hall?"

"I was thinking the same thing."

Gabriella spun around to see her brother Luke standing behind her.

"Hey Luke…" she muttered.

"Gabriella since when do you talk to Troy?" he asked harshly.

Gabriella brushed past her brother with Taylor on her trial. "I don't talk to him. He just said hi to me."

"Troy doesn't say hi to just any girl, Gabriella." Luke said following him. "You're my little sister and there is no reason that you should be getting involved with a guy like him."

"Chad introduced me to him at the mall and that's it." She spat at her brother. "Now just drop it." She said before grabbing Taylor's hand and dragging her into their Advanced Chemistry class.

"Okay now that we've ditched the overprotective, tell me what really happened." Taylor said as they slid into their seats in the front of the classroom. "I mean, I see him at every basketball practice and game and he doesn't talk to me."

"That's pretty much what happened. Chad introduced us at the mall and he ended up giving me a ride home. And he was really irritating and reminded me a lot of my brothers." Gabriella told her friend.

"Too bad. Because if you two hooked up then we could double date."

Gabriella snorted a laugh. "The day I hook up with a basketball guy, or any sports guy for that matter, will be the day the sky falls."

-------------------

Gabriella sat in the library, as she usually did during free period. Her mind was entranced in her history textbook as her hand feverously scribbled notes in a notebook.

"Hey."

Gabriella saw a boy shapped figure slide into the seat next to her. She ignored him.

"Gabriella? It's me Troy." He said, trying to get her attention on him and out of the book. "Remember?"

She chose to ignore him again. Nobody was going to interrupt her when she was taking notes.

"I drove you home yesterday, from the mall. Chad introduced us." Troy said, repeating yesterday's events. "I called your best friend a nerd. And I guess I kind of called you a nerd too…"

"Yes Troy. I remember you." Gabriella said frustrated. She kept her eyes on her book. "Now what do you want?"

"I thought that we kind of got off on the wrong foot and I wanted to make amend."

"Seeing as we didn't get off on any foot, I doubt that you could improve something that doesn't exist."

"You are totally different than I thought you would be." Troy said as he gazed upon the brunette who was feverously still taking notes.

"You don't know me at all." She told him bluntly. "Now don't you have free throws to go practice?"

Troy grinned. "So you know what a free throw is. I'm impressed."

"In case you have already forgotten, I have seven brothers; one of which is on your team." She told him. "But with your 2.0 GPA it's a no-brainer that you couldn't connect the dots."

Troy's mouth opened, stunned. No one had ever dared talk to him that way, especially not a girl. "How did you know I have a two point?"

"A 2.0 is the lowest GPA you can have without getting kicked off the team and you struck me as the kind of guy who does as little as possible when it come to academics." Gabriella finally broke her stare away from her book and looked at Troy. "Now I have notes to take. And you have free throws to practice so that you can make more than 28 percent of them in the game." She turned her attention back to her book, expecting Troy to leave.

"How did you know my free throw average?" Troy asked, his face shocked.

Gabriella sighed heavily. "Taylor is the basketball manager and I help out occasionally." She told him. "And yes, your dad does know."

Troy stared at Gabriella. Not once had someone talked to him like that. The other students treated him as a God and the teachers let him slide by with anything. This girl challenged everything he thought he knew about the school.

"Alright." He finally spoke. "I'll go practice; as long as you promise to come to the game."

"Whatever." She muttered in response. She heard Troy leave her to her work, but not before one last comment.

"I'll be looking for you at the game, Gabriella."

--------------------

Gabriella stood at the top of the stairs. She braced herself for what was coming. Slowly she walked down the stairs and into the living room filled with her brothers, all prepping for the big game.

"Hey Gabriella, just in time!" Kevin yelled at her. "We were just strategizing."

"Yeah, we figured half would get the food while the others went to the bathroom." Trevor started.

"And then the other half would go to the bathroom while the others would go grab seats." Scott finished. "So what do you think?"

Gabriella took her seat on the couch. "That's great guys." She said a little uneasily. "But I think I'm going to have to miss out on the game." At that moment, seven pairs of eyes fell upon her and seven faces were stunned.

"What?" Jason asked in a small voice. "You can't miss a game."

"It's been a family tradition since Trevor was on the team." Cole muttered.

"And this is a big game for us." Luke told her, shifting uncomfortably in his red, black, and white basketball suit. "You can't just not go."

"I know that games are a big deal…" she started.

"They are a huge deal!" Ian interrupted.

"But," she said, ignoring his comment. "My heart just isn't into going."

Luke's face grew stern. "This is about Bolton isn't it?" he accused.

"No." Gabriella said harshly.

"You don't want us to find out that you're dating him!"

"Trust me, I am **not **dating him."

"Then why won't you come to the game?" Kevin cried out.

Gabriella threw her arms up. "Fine! I'll go to the game." She said irritably. "Happy now?"

Luke looked at his sister. "We don't want you to go if you're going to be all upset about it…"

Her mouth dropped open. "Brothers are so irritating!" she lifted herself off the couch and started her way back up the stairs.

"So you'll be back down in twenty minutes for the game?" she heard Kevin ask behind her. She heard a smack and a loud screech. "What the hell was that for?"

Gabriella tried to stop herself, but a smile spread across her face.

Thirty minutes later she was sitting next to Trevor as he drove to the game. "You're going to glad you came Gabi."

"Yeah, whatever…" she muttered. Gabriella leaned against the window and stared at the passing houses as she listened to her brothers in the back seat talk about her.

"Maybe she's PMSing?" Kevin whispered.

"What's PMSing?" Jason asked. Gabriella could imagine his big brown eyes staring up at his older brothers.

"Gosh Jason, you're such a kid!" Ian gripped.

"Shut up Ian, you're only a year older!" Kevin told his little brother.

"I'm a year and a half older!" Ian yelled.

Kevin snorted. "Like it makes a difference."

"All three of you pipe down!" Trevor yelled. "We're almost there and I don't want to hear any of you say another word."

"You're not the boss of me." Kevin grumbled.

"You want to walk?" Trevor shot back at him.

"You wouldn't. There are robbers and bad guys on the streets."

"That's a chance I am willing to take." Trevor told him. "So either shut up until the game starts or you're walking there and back."

--------------------

"Gabriella sweetie, why don't you go sit with Taylor like you usually do?" her mom asked as Gabriella followed her family up the bleachers.

Gabriella looked across the court and say Taylor sitting at the end of the team's bench with a clip board in her hand. The empty seat next to her was usually filled by Gabriella. "No mom, it's okay. I'll just sit with you guys tonight." She said, hoping her mother would buy the act she was putting out.

"Now you know that I always go talk to the other moms during games and I know that you don't want to sit with your dad and your brothers for three hours while they scream and yell at the refs." Her mother told her. "Go sit with Taylor." Gabriella's mom pushed her back down the bleachers.

She sighed, realizing that her mother was absolutely right. Her only hope was that Troy and Luke didn't see her. But who was she kidding; of course they were going to see her. They were going to be sitting right next to her.

Gabriella took her usual seat next to Taylor and put on a smile. "So what are our prospects?"

"Coach Bolton will probably die from shock if we don't win this one." Taylor told her. "And the boys have already planned a blowout victory party, so they better win."

Gabriella laughed. "Did they invite you?"

"They always invite me. But I always choose to spend my time in a place that doesn't have drunken cheerleaders walking around."

"Kevin is always begging me to get him invited to one." Gabriella said. "And I always have to point out that I, being the sister or one of the star players, am never invited."

"You know if you became a manager you would get invited." Taylor suggested.

Gabriella shook her head. "No way. I spend enough time around basketball as it is. I don't need to go to a party celebrating it." She told her friend. "And aren't you only a manager because of Chad?"

Taylor blushed and smiled. "Well it does give a front row seat of my baby at his finest."

Gabriella laughed. "Speaking of your baby, he's on his way over."

Taylor happily spun around in her chair to meet Chad. The two talked for approximately three second before they kissed and got yelled at by the coach.

"He yells at us practically every game." Taylor complained once she and Chad parted ways.

"Well if you didn't kiss one of his starters every game that probably wouldn't happen." Gabriella pointed out as the announcer came over the intercom.

Taylor rolled her eyes and stood up clapping as the players were introduced.

As much as Gabriella hated to admit it, she loved the game. She loved to watch it, she loved to play it, she loved to be involved with it in any way possible.

And before she knew it the buzzer was signaling half time. The Wildcats were up by 30 and barely any of them had broken a sweat.

"This is probably one of the most boring games this season." Taylor complained, slumping down in her seat.

"It is the most boring one." Gabriella agreed, also sinking in her seat as they watched the players head to the locker room.

"Well Miss Montez how would you like to accompany Taylor on our first districts games?" Coach Bolton asked as he followed him boys out of the gym. "I promise they will be more exciting than this one and we could sure use the help."

Gabriella opened her mouth to answer, but Taylor beat her to it. "She'd love to!" Taylor said in a hurry.

"Excellent." The coach said as he left the girls to enjoy the half time entertainment.

Gabriella gaped at her friend. "Taylor?"

"I'm sorry Gabi, but I have been manager since freshman year and I am always alone with the boys on the big away games and I thought it would be nice to have some female companionship for once." Gabriella let out a heavy sigh. "And you said that Trevor and Scott always go to away games and Luke will be there, so it's not like you will be totally without family…"

Gabriella let out a small smile. "Being without family isn't the problem."

"So…? Will you come?" Taylor asked hopefully.

"Sure, why not?" Gabriella said, causing Taylor to let out a squeal.

"Yay! Now have some popcorn and let's make fun of the cheerleaders."

She smiled and stuck her hand in the popcorn bowl Taylor had offered her and settled back into her seat to watch the half time entertainment.

* * *

**On my gosh, 9 favorites, 19 reviews and 27 alerts, just for the first chapter! You guys are too amazing. Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed. And I'm going to try and update this as soon as I can, but I'm trying to makeg these chapters long, so it takes longer to write.**

**And I hope everyone enjoyed this chapter. As you can tell, their characters are pretty AU, but that makes it fun for me.**


	3. I'm a Big Girl

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 3: I'm a Big Girl**

A week later, Taylor and Gabriella were sitting in their same seats at the end of the player's bench. Gabriella cheered on the team, trying to stop her mind from replaying the last week's events. Her daily, unwanted interactions with Troy had her on high alert and stressed out and it didn't go unnoticed. Each of her brothers were pressuring her to tell them what is going on in her life that has her so tense. But she knew better to tell them that Troy Bolton wouldn't stop talking to her (no matter how much she insulted, snapped at, and even plain out ignored him) and that every guy that used to seem remotely friendly towards her is now choosing not to be seen with her out of pure fear of her four older brothers.

Gabriella watched at Troy put the ball in the air and watched it glide into the net. The crowd went wild, as did the coach.

The game continued as usual: the five starters were the stars of the show while the others were their trusty wingmen. That was until the ball went out on the Dragons right next to the end of the Wildcat's team bench. And Troy was to take it in.

"So Gabriella, how do you like the game so far?" He asked her casually as he looked for the open man.

Gabriella was so stunned, not a word came out. Taylor sat by her friend, intrigued at the basketball player's gesture.

"I'll take that as you are too stunned by my good looks and my amazing basketball skills to say anything." He said smirking, ignoring the two open men. "Happens all the time, I totally understand."

"Hey Romeo, you need to throw the ball in." One of the referees barked at Troy.

He nonchalantly threw the ball at Chad as he stepped inbounds. Chad threw it right back to him.

"So Gabriella, you have yet to answer my question." He said, turning him back to the court. "How do you like the game so far?"

"It'd be a lot better if you were actually playing." She finally said.

"So you like watching me play?" Troy said, still smirking.

Gabriella wanted to slap the smile off of him face. "That's not what I said." She defended herself.

"But you implied it." Gabriella rolled her eyes at him. "So why don't you come with me to the after party?"

"And why would I do that?"

"Why wouldn't you?" he challenged.

"I don't go to parties like that." She told him.

"Troy!" Coach Bolton was red in the face. "Anytime now!"

Troy spun around and shot the ball into the net as if couldn't be easier. As the rest of his team hustled down the court, Troy stayed next to Gabriella.

"As I understand it you don't party at all."

"What have you been digging up dirt on me?" she accused him.

"Not particularly since there is no dirt to find."

Gabriella rolled her eyes again. "Why don't you just get back in the game?"

"Not until you agree to go to the victory party with me."

Gabriella slumped back in her seat. "Whatever."

"Troy Jackson Bolton! If you don't get in this game in ten seconds, you'll be off of the team for the rest of the season!" Coach Bolton yelled at his son, who seemed unfazed.

Gabriella's glance shot at the clock. There were only 15 second left in the game and the score was tied. Her eyes furiously moved between Troy and the clock. She couldn't let her team loose, but she couldn't go to a party with Troy Bolton.

The clock seemed to count down in slow motion. She watched the red numbers get smaller and smaller.

"Okay! I'll go with you!" she yelled as a six glowed red over the court.

Troy beamed and ran to the free throw line. Luke chucked the ball from half court into Troy's hands. He put up the shot and the crowd watched as the Wildcats won at the buzzer.

Taylor leaned over to Gabriella, "Maybe I will actually go to this victory party."

Gabriella stayed quiet as the players went through their end of game routines. By the time the boys were heading back to the locker rooms, she was ready to leave.

"Hey Gabriella, I hear you are going to the after party with Troy." Chad said, walking next to his friend.

"Yeah right, I just said that so one of our most important players wouldn't be benched right before districts." Gabriella told him.

"You might want to reconsider that." Chad said uneasily.

"Why?"

"Well, Troy already mentioned to the team that you were going with him tonight and Luke didn't seem too thrilled. And you can probably guess that none of them were too happy when they saw you talking with him during the game." Chad told her. "So it's either face one or six plus your dad."

Gabriella sighed. "Just make sure that Troy gets out of the locker room before Luke. I'd rather face him at the party after a few drinks soften him up."

"Will do." Chad followed him teammates out of sight.

Gabriella leaned on the white brick walls trying to figure out how she was going to get through the night. "This sucks." She groaned.

"Well then things can only get better." Taylor told her. "That is until Saturday when we leave with the team for an overnighter in Santa Fe."

Gabriella moaned. "I have to spend an hour on the bus with him and my brother?"

"Actually because the school is required to stop every hour and Coach Bolton likes to take detours he calls short-cuts, it's two hours on the bus."

Gabriella banged her head on the wall behind her. "Ow…" she muttered.

Ten minutes later Troy stumbled out of the locker room to find Gabriella and Taylor standing by the door.

"It's a little early to start drinking isn't it?" Gabriella sniped at him.

"No, it's Chad. He pushed me out of the locker room."

Gabriella sighed. "Sure." She said, knowing that it was true. "I'll see you later Tay." She mumbled to her friend as Troy led her down the empty hallway.

As the two reached the outside, Troy slid him arm across Gabriella's shoulders. She instantly shrugged it off.

"Look, just because I agreed to go with you doesn't mean that I am with you." She told him sharply.

"Why else would you agree to go if you if it wasn't because you liked me?"

"I just didn't want to see our team loose an important player right before districts."

"Or so you say." He said.

"I say it because it's true." She told him. "Some of us don't have a daily lie quota they have to fill."

"You know your comebacks aren't as strong as when we've first met." He pointed out.

"We met a week ago."

Troy ignored her comment. "Is it possible that I am wearing you down?"

Gabriella looked straight into his crystal blue eyes. "Not even close."

--------------------

Gabriella stubbornly followed Troy through the front door of a large white house. The front room was filled with the 'in-crowd' and their cups of alcohol. Gabriella was not impressed.

"So this is what Luke does after every game." She said as she picked up a black lace bra that was without its owner. "Why am I even the least bit surprised?"

Troy took her free hand and pulled her quickly across the room. She stumbled after him, dropping the loose bra on an unsuspecting couple. "Where are you taking me?" she asked. "And why are you death gripping my hand?" Troy ignored her questions and pulled her down a hallway which, unlike the rest of the house, was empty. "Troy what the hell is going on?" she asked, her temper rising. Troy pulled her into a doorway and pressed her up against the wall and put his mouth on Gabriella's.

At that moment, nothing else mattered. Gabriella wanted to live inside Troy's kiss. He did things to her mouth that made Gabriella realize what it was for. For 16 years she had been using it for eating and talking and sticking her tongue out at her brothers. But its solitary function in life was to experience the wonders that Troy was performing on it. He did things to her mouth that Gabriella couldn't think possible. Troy stroked his tongue along her teeth and stroked the insides of her cheeks.

Gabriella pulled on his jacket and he willingly moved closer to her. His hands entangled themselves in her long, dark locks while he kissed her harder. She wrapped her arms around his waist, getting as close as possible to him. Her mind was lost in the kiss. It seemed to last for ages before Troy pulled away.

Gabriella was pressed against the wall as Troy put a hand above her and leaned down. "Kiss you later Montez." And before she knew it, he was gone.

She stared at the empty space that was occupied by Troy. Her mind was spinning, her lips hurt, and at the moment she had no way home. Composing herself, she ventured back out to the party.

"Gabriella!" she saw Taylor running up to her. "Where were you? Chad and I were right behind you and then you and Troy just disappeared. What happened?"

"I can honestly say that I am really pissed at him." She said, her eyes wandering around for her alleged date.

"Don't you already, like, hate him?"

"Yeah, but he just kicked it up a notch." Gabriella told her. "Have you seen my brother? I need a ride home."

"Actually I think he is talking to Chad, and Troy."

Gabriella sighed. "Figures…" she walked through the crowd of people, her eyes on her brother.

"Gabriella." Troy said happily as he let his eyes look up and down her. "Here to see me?" he asked, smirking.

She put her hand up to Troy, "Please." Gabriella turned to her brother. "I need a ride home." She told him.

Luke looked from his sister to Troy who stood behind her. "Fine, but we need to have a serious talk."

"Just as long as I get home."

Luke started to leave his friends, but was stopped by Troy. "I'll give Gabriella a ride home, she's my date."

"Bolton, if you value your health you'll move out of my way."

Troy glared at Luke, "Fine." He stepped out of the way and leaned over to Gabriella. "Don't forget our about that conversation we had earlier." Troy winked at her and went back to talking with his friends.

Gabriella glared at Troy and whipped her head around. She wasn't about to let Troy Bolton get the best of her.

She didn't say a word to her brother until they got in the car and started the drive home. "Thanks for taking me home. I know you probably wanted to stay longer."

"You know, I don't even know what to say to you Gabriella." Luke said angrily. "All of us told you to stay away from Troy."

"You tell me to stay away from every boy." She told him.

"And then you go on and go to a party with him anyways." He said, ignoring her comment. "Why the hell would you do something like that? Do you need me to spell it out for you?"

Gabriella slumped against the window. "What happened to not knowing what to say?" she asked quietly.

"He's not a good guy and there is no reason you should be dating or even hanging out with him."

"I'm not dating or hanging out with him!" she defended herself. "He keeps talking to me and bugging me and wont leave me alone."

"Then what was that at the game? You two looked pretty friendly."

"Coach Bolton was going to kick him off the team if he didn't get back in the game and he wouldn't get back in the game unless I agreed to go to the party with him." She explained. "No friendly feelings what so ever."

Luke snorted. "Yeah right. Troy doesn't talk to a girl unless he is hitting on her."

"Well I'm not hitting back." She fiercely told him. "And yes I do realize how ridiculous that sounded."

Luke cracked a smile. "You do know that all we want is the best for you."

Gabriella sighed. "Yeah, I know."

"And we don't think that the best has come along yet."

"But isn't that for me to decide?"

"Not when it comes to Troy Bolton." Luke told her. "He's not-"

"A good guy." She finished for her brother. "You said that and I get it. But I can handle myself. I'm a big girl."

"I know you are Gabs, but you'll always be my little sister and I'll always want to keep you safe. All of us will. It's just because we love you."

Gabriella grinned. "I think this is one of the nicest conversations we've ever had."

Luke nodded in agreement. "And to think it all happened because of Troy Bolton."

Gabriella laughed. "At least he's good for something."

"And now we can stop talking about him."

"Deal." She smiled over at her brother. They were all right. As long as Troy didn't interfere anymore, they were alright.

* * *

**So, I hope you guys liked the chapter! I think there were a few good Troy and Gabriella moments in there, don't you?**

**And remember to review! The more I get, the more I am compelled to write more. Can we shoot for 15 this chapter?**


	4. It's so Naley, it's Troyella

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 4: It's so Naley, it's Troyella**

Gabriella paced around her room Friday morning. She was leaving for school in one hour to get on the bus and spend two days in a hotel with the basketball team for their first districts competition. "So on Monday, Troy kissed me. He really **kissed** me. And then the rest of the week he's acted like nothing happened. I mean once you kiss someone, don't you usually act a little differently towards them? Or at least acknowledge the fact that you pressed them us against the wall and attacked their mouth with your tongue?"

"Gabi are you talking to yourself?" she heard Luke yell through the wall.

"No." she yelled back. "I'm talking to Sarah." She learned down to the golden dog that sat on her floor. "Isn't that right girl? You're always here to listen to me because if I told Taylor any of this, she would freak."

The yellow dog jumped on Gabriella and licked her face.

Luke walked into his sister's room. "Gabriella, coach just called. He wanted us at school now." He smiled when he saw the dog. "Come on Sarah!"

The gold dog jumped off of Gabriella and followed Luke out the door.

Gabriella sighed and pushed herself off the floor and grabbed her duffle bag. "One hour down, 47 to go." Once out her bedroom door she was bombarded by her mother's hug. "Mom, I'm only going to be gone for two days…"

"I know sweetie, but this will be the first time you're going to an away basketball game." She told her. "And you'll be in a hotel without your father and me."

"But I'll be with Taylor." She said, prying away from the hug. "I'll be fine. And Luke and Scott and Trevor will all be there to look out for me. Not to mention Chad."

"I'm just going to miss my little girl."

Gabriella smiled. "I'll miss you too Mom, but I'll be back Sunday afternoon." Her mom let her walk down the stairs and meet Luke at the door. "Ready bro?"

Luke swung an arm around Gabriella's shoulders. "Ready sis."

They bother yelled goodbye to the rest of the house before they headed out the door.

--------------------

"So we've lasted the whole bus ride and nothing major has happened." Taylor noted as the bus pulled up to the hotel. "That's two hours and you haven't yelled at anyone."

"And you haven't kissed Chad." Gabriella pointed out. "Absolutely astonishing."

Taylor rolled her eyes. "Make fun, but remember it was you who introduced us."

"Yeah, yeah, I know. You became the basketball manager freshman year because you wanted Chad to notice you but he never did and then you realized that he was friends with my brother and somewhat friends with me so you had me introduce you and within a week you couldn't keep your hands off of each other." Gabriella said as they led the team off the bus and into the office.

"Exactly." Taylor smiled. "And once you find the basketball boy of your dreams you'll be the same way."

"Who said anything about a basketball boy?"

"Oh please, you and Troy are totally meant to be." Taylor told her. "I mean jerky basketball boy makes it his goal to get outspoken smart girl to like him even though girl is annoyed by boy, but in someway girl sort of respects that boy is willing to go after something besides basketball so avidly. It's so Naley, it's Troyella." Taylor finished with a smile.

Gabriella stared at her friend. "You really need to lay off of the One Tree Hill DVDs."

"And you need to spot denying fate!"

Coach Bolton made his way to the front of the group. "Team!" Taylor let out a slight cough. "And Taylor and Gabriella." He added. "Here are your room assignments. Practice is at North Santa Fe High at eleven. The bus leaves as 10:45, if you miss it, you better be at practice. Our first game is at 2:00 and I expect us to win." With that last statement, he handed out the room assignments and keys and made his way up to his own room.

Gabriella silently followed Taylor up to their room while she droned on about how she and Troy were perfect for each other.

"Taylor, last time I checked you didn't like Troy and thought he only does what he does so he can get into girls' pants." Gabriella pointed out as she shoved open their door.

"Oh, it's all still the same, but I think that you can change him." She said happily. "And I think more happened at that party than you are telling me."

"Whatever…" Gabriella mumbled as she dropped her duffle bag onto the lone queen bed. "Hey Tay, I guess we are sharing a bed."

Taylor ignored her as she opened the door that joined them to another room. "I wonder who's in this room." She said with a smile. As the other door opened, Chad appeared. "Chad, how weird is that?"

Gabriella rolled her eyes. "Taylor, if you wanted to be with Chad so badly why didn't you just switch the room assignments so that you two were sharing and not just next door."

Taylor's mouth opened in a wider smiled. "Why that is a great idea Gabriella." Taylor ran across the room and grabbed Gabriella's duffle bag. "See you later!" she shoved Gabriella and her duffle bag into the next room.

"Taylor." She whispered. "Are you guys…?"

"Oh, no. He hasn't earned the privilege to deflower me." Taylor told her. "I just want to spend a little bit of uninterrupted time with him. And see how long it takes him to get his hair ready in the mornings."

Before Taylor slammed the door on Gabriella she heard Chad yell goodbye. Hugging her duffle bag, Gabriella turned around to face her new room. "At least this room has two beds…" She dropped her bag and jumped onto the bed. Gabriella looked through the room service menu for something to eat seeing as she was shoved out of the house before breakfast. "Luke is going to freak if he finds out that I am sharing a room with one of his teammates."

Twenty minutes later she had breakfast ordered and the TV was on. As she lounged on the bed she had claimed a loud pounding came at the door. "Chad let me in! You have both room keys!"

It hadn't yet occurred to Gabriella that Chad would have had a roommate who would notice that she was there instead of him. She lugged herself out of bed and ripped open the room to see the one and only standing before her.

He smirked once he saw Gabriella in the doorway. "You're sure not Chad, but I'm not complaining." Troy brushed past her and dumped his stuff on the empty bed.

Gabriella followed him. "You're Chad's roommate?"

"Well, I was. But seeing as you are in here and Chad is probably in the next room over with Taylor, I guess I am your roommate." He turned around and smiled at her. "Ready for that pillow fight?"

She rolled her eyes and sat herself back down on her bed. "Taylor is so going to pay for this."

Another knock came at the door and Troy turned around and answered it.

"Room service." A small man pushed a food cart into the room.

"You already ordered me breakfast," Troy gazed at the food, then at Gabriella. "How sweet." Troy turned back to the door to see the man still standing there. "I guess you want a tip, hunh…" he man smiled at him. "Here's a tip, get a better job." And Troy shut the door and grabbed the food.

"Troy!" Gabriella exclaimed. "That was really rude."

Troy shrugged. "It was good advice. And I'm all out of cash." Gabriella glared at Troy as he opened up the cart. "Do you seriously eat this much?" he gaped at the amount of food.

"I couldn't decide what I wanted." She told him icily as she watched him shoved a sausage into his mouth. "But now that your mouth has been all over it, I don't think I want it anymore."

"Come on Gabriella, you know you like the taste of my mouth." Her jaw fell. "Or were those little moans and pulling me as close as possible to you just for fun? Because, well, it was fun." He said smiling.

"Look," Gabriella said annoyed. "As far as I'm concerned that kiss didn't happen."

Troy's face fell, but he tried not to show it. "So it didn't mean anything to you?" his tone had softened.

Gabriella looked over at Troy; her voice had suddenly caught in her thought. "No." she said quietly. "So can we just call it a mistake?"

Troy reluctantly nodded his head. "Sure. A mistake. I mean a kiss is just a kiss right? They don't mean anything." He pushed the food cart over to her. "Here's your breakfast. I'm going to go for a run; I'll see you at practice."

Gabriella watched Troy exit the room without one of his signature last lines that made her lips purse, her eyes glare, and her stomach churn. She heard a light knock on the wall opposite her. Gabriella watched Chad walk through the door.

"Hey Gabs…" he said quietly. "I heard three door slams and I thought that couldn't be good."

Gabriella glared at him. "You better stay a good arm swinging length away from me if you value any part of your body." She warned him. "You knew that Taylor was going to switch rooms and that I would end up with Troy."

"I didn't know Taylor wanted to switch rooms." Chad said innocently. Gabriella continued to stare at him. "Okay, I did, but I didn't think that it would cause too much trouble. I mean, he'll flirt with you and you'll yell at him, no harm."

"No harm?" Gabriella repeated, lifting herself off the bed. "You knew that Troy kissed me at that stupid party and you thought there would be no harm?"

Chad's jaw dropped. "Troy kissed you?" he asked, slightly confused.

Gabriella looked at Chad with a puzzled expression. "He didn't tell you? He tells you everything."

Chad ran his fingers through his curly hair. "Why wouldn't he tell me that he hooked up with one of my best friends?" he asked quietly. "It doesn't make sense."

"Chad you have to promise not to say a word of this to anyone. Especially Taylor or my brothers."

"I don't want to talk to your brothers about your social life. I don't have a death wish."

Gabriella giggled. "So I guess that since you didn't know about 'it' that it is safe for you to hug me."

Chad's smile gleamed as he wrapped his arms around his friend. "I'm sorry that you're probably going to end up committing murder by the end of this trip."

She muffled a laugh into his chest. "Since I'm guessing that Tay is doing homework, do you want to watch TV and have breakfast with me?"

"You know how much I love breakfast!" Chad jumped onto Gabriella's bed, serving himself pancakes and eggs.

--------------------

Gabriella marked a 'W' next to their last game of the day. "Three wins for today, not bad." She said to Taylor as they sat in the practically empty gym.

"Coach is happy." Taylor said. "He pushed curfew back to midnight."

"Do you seriously think that any of them will be up to parting after three games in a row?"

"Gabi, Gabi, Gabi…" a voice droned behind them. "You underestimate the willpower of an East High basketballer." Gabriella didn't have to look; she knew it was Trevor, with Scott standing right next to him. "These guys can go for hours after games."

"Why do you think there is a party after every game?" Scott added.

"You know Gabriella, you're brothers are right." Taylor said. "They know how to party."

"So be careful at the party Gabs." Scott told her. "We know what goes on."

"In the 16 years that you guys have known me, have I ever been interested in parting?" she asked rhetorically.

The sound of a dribbling basketball and cheers came from the opposite end of the gym. Both Scott and Trevor jumped up from the bleachers and ran over to the East High basketball players.

"They just finished three games!" Gabriella exclaimed. "How can play anymore?"

Taylor sighed. "For being a kid in your basketball family you sure ask a lot of weird questions."

Taylor led Gabriella across the gym where the boys were shooting around. As Taylor snuggled herself up to Chad, Luke passed Gabriella the ball. Smiling, Gabriella shot the ball and everyone watched it float into the net.

"Who knew Gabriella had game?" Troy asked, standing a mere 10 feet away from her. This was the first thing he has said to her since that morning. "Feel like one-on-one?"

Her brothers stared at her, waiting for her reply. "I don't think so." She declined.

"Oh, is someone scared?" Trot taunted her.

Her eyes narrowed. "No." Gabriella stripped off her grey East High sweatshirt exposing her bright red tank top to match her red and white shoes and jeans. She ripped the hair tie off of her wrist and pulled her hair up into a pony tail. "Bring it on."

Chad and Taylor pushed her brothers off of the court along with the rest of the team. They all situated themselves on the bleachers to watch the game.

"First to 11?" she asked, shoving the ball into Troy's stomach. "You can take it out."

* * *

**I totally wasn't planning on updating for at least a few days, but today I woke up to 17 reviews (you guys ROCK) and that just made me want to update (Plus Fergie's _Big Girls Don't Cry_ music video was on and Milo is one of the cutest things on this earth, even with all the tatoos...)**

**This is for pixie202 (possibly everyone) but here are the ages of Gabriella brothers (and friends) as of this chapter: Trevor-21 (Jr in college); Scott- 19 (Soph in college); Luke and Cole- 17 (Sr in High School); Gabriella/Troy/Chad/Taylor- 16 (Jr in High School); Kevin- 14 (Fresh in High School); Ian- 11 (6th grade); and Evan- 10 (4th grade). I hope that clears things up.**

**This is totally my favorite chapter to write so far! Gah, I love it so much. I hope you guys loved it too!**


	5. You're different

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 5: You're different**

Hairs had fallen out of Gabriella's pony tail and stuck to the side of her face and her forehead glistened with droplets of sweat. Troy had stripped down to his jeans and t-shirt and his bangs stuck to his forehead. Gabriella was standing at the three point line, the ball securely between her hands. Troy was opposite at her.

"10 to 10, not bad Gabriella, but you're still not going to win." Troy said.

"In case you haven't noticed I have the ball and all I have to do is make a three pointer and the game is mine." Gabriella told him.

"To make a three pointer you either jump it or go around me and back across." He started. "You're too short to jump it with me right here and there is no way you are getting around me."

Gabriella smirked at him. "You seem to forget that I've grown up in a basketball family. I have a dad who was an all star at Duke, two former East High MVP brothers, one who is going to by MVP, and two more looking to become MVP in the next few years."

"You may have family all stars, but that doesn't mean you have enough to win a game."

Gabriella started to dribble the ball. She faked right, but Troy didn't move. She faked right again, but he still didn't move. On her third fake, Troy swung in front of her. Gabriella quickly moved around him. She stepped back behind the three point line and shot the ball as Troy stumbled to stop her. The entire gym watched the ball glide into the hoop.

"Looks like I do have enough to win a game." She whispered in his ear before picking up her sweatshirt and walking over to the bleachers to meet Taylor and Chad.

"That was awesome!" Taylor exclaimed. "Who knew you could play?"

Gabriella just shrugged shyly at her friend's comment.

"You've learned a lot since the last time we played." Chad nudged her.

"You learn a little everyday and before you know it…" she said smiling.

"You are beating a Wildcat superstar at his own game!" Taylor exclaimed. "This is huge!"

Gabriella grinned. "It was nothing."

"That's what so cool about it!" Taylor said excitedly. "You beat him so easily."

"Actually it wasn't that easy." She admitted. "My brothers never play full out with me, so I was not prepared for him to. But it was nice to be treated equally on the court fro once."

"Hey Chad!" one of his teammates yelled. "Swimming pool back at the hotel!"

Chad gave Taylor a quick kiss goodbye before leaving the gym with his friends.

"You just let him go?" Gabriella asked curiously.

"Coach will most likely be watching from his room or have a spy down there and if he sees both Chad and I gone, he'll flip." She explained.

Gabriella nodded and smiled. "You got this whole weekend worked out, don't you?"

"Why yes, I do." Taylor said with a smile plastered to her face.

Gabriella felt an arm sling around her shoulders. "Who knew little sis could play that well?" Scott asked.

"All this time we were taking it easy on you and you could have creamed us." Trevor added.

"Well, she could have creamed you guys. Me she can never beat." Luke said with a smirk.

Gabriella's jaw dropped slightly. "Is that a challenge?"

"Maybe."

"Well maybe their year for your birthday you'll be getting the gift of defeat by your little sister." She said, smirking back.

"Yeah, how did you get Mom to let you go out of town for your birthday?" Trevor asked.

"This morning she was a little too preoccupied with Gabriella coming on the trip to realize that mine and Cole's birthday was within 24 hours." He told them. "It was kind of nice actually."

"You do know that she is going to make everything 10 times bigger because she wasn't there to celebrate it with you on the day, right?" Scott told him.

Luke sighed. "You're right…this sucks."

The rest of the grouped laughed. "Well happy almost 18th birthday. We'll all have to call Cole tomorrow since he's going to be taking Mom's birthday bambardment alone." Gabriella said smiling, her brothers nodded in agreement. "Now go off with the rest of the team and raid the pool."

The boys smiled. "It's like you can read our minds." Scott said, backing out of the gym. "See you girls tomorrow!"

Gabriella and Taylor waved goodbye before they started their slow exit from the school.

"Sometimes you're brothers are okay." Taylor told her.

Gabriella nodded her head in agreement. "They have their moments. But if you want to take a few to have as your own, be my guest."

Twenty minutes later Taylor and Gabriella parted ways at the rooms. As Gabriella slid the key in the lock she wondered how Troy would act to her in the post game. She noisily slammed the door behind her and threw herself onto the bed before she realized she wasn't alone.

"Troy?" she said surprised. "I thought you would be down at the pool with everyone else."

He shifted on his bed. "Didn't feel like being around people after that game." He said in a serious voice.

"Oh, well I'm sorry." She said half heartedly. "But you do know that even if you would have won, you still would have lost. You would have beaten a girl; where's the honor in that?"

He sighed. "I guess you're right. It's just that only Chad and Luke have ever beaten me in pickup games, so you'd imagine my shock when a girl like you beat me."

"A girl like me?"

"Yeah, you know…pretty, smart, small, someone who speaks her mind. You're not even on the girls' basketball team. And I guess you don't belong there because they're all pretty butch…"

"Troy what are you getting at?" she asked as he continued to ramble on.

"I guess in a weird way I'm trying to say good game. You deserve to beat me."

Gabriella smiled at him. "Thanks. And it was a good game. You deserve to be on the starting lineup."

Troy smile down at his hands. "I guess me being the coach's son has something to do with it."

"Troy if you ever doubt that you deserve your spot on the team, just forget about it. You're a good ball player no matter who your dad is."

Troy smiled again. "You know I think this is the first nice conversation that we've ever had." He finally turned to look at Gabriella.

"It's the first conversation we've had where you're not being an ass." She told him, staring into his eyes.

Troy chuckled quietly. "I guess I haven't been very decent to you have I?"

"Decent? No. Honest? Not really. Yourself? After this conversation, I don't know."

"It's just that all of the other girls in school fall all over me and they would kill to get a date with me. And, usually, that's how I like it. I don't have to try to hard. But you're different. You challenged everything I thought I knew about the school and how it works. You're a smart girl, but you're beautiful and really not afraid to say what's on your mind. I've never seen those three put into one girl. And then you don't fall over yourself to get to me. You ignore me and have a comeback for everything I throw at you and you pretty much tell me to get out of your life. You're different."

Gabriella opened her mouth to respond to his speech, but was cut off by a loud thump on the door. "Gabriella open up!" she heard her brother yell. "It's Luke, Scott, and Trevor."

The mood in the room had drastically changed. "Oh my gosh." She whispered. "You need to get out of here now."

"We're on the third floor." Troy exclaimed in a hushed tone. "You want me to jump and hope I make it?"

"Of course not! I wouldn't do that to you." Gabriella jumped off of her bed and grabbed Troy's hand. She shoved him into the bathroom. "Hide in there."

"What if they have to use it?" he asked, standing in the doorframe.

"I don't know, hide in the shower." She suggested before closing the door on Troy and opening the door for her brothers.

"What took you so long?" Scott asked as the three of them brushed past her.

"I wasn't really decent." She lied.

"Gabs," Luke said as he grabbed the TV remote. "We live with you. I doubt that we haven't seen you at your worst."

Gabriella rolled her eyes. "What are you guys doing here anyways?"

"Picking out a movie to watch."

"Don't you guys have two other rooms that you can do that in?"

"My roommate is entertaining one of the cheerleaders."

"And if we order a movie from our room, the school doesn't pay for it." Trevor explained. "Which left you."

"What do you guys think? Friday Nigh Lights? We Are Marshall?" Luke suggested.

"Taylor could be coming back any minute and I don't think she would like it if our room was taken over by the likes of you."

"I heard that Taylor is off with Chad." Luke told her. "So then we though that we'd watch a movie in their room but since Troy never appeared at the pool it is safe to say that he is also entertaining a guest."

Gabriella tugged at her sweatshirt uncomfortably. "Why don't you guys come back tomorrow to watch a movie, after you've already won the rest of your games?" she suggested, hoping that they would take her offer.

"Gabi, tomorrow we are playing seven games if we keep winning. We'll be too tired to watch a movie."

"Why do you want us to leave so bad?" Scott asked her, looking at his sister curiously.

"You hiding something Gabs?" Trevor asked. "Like a guy?"

Gabriella pushed Troy's bag further behind the bed with her foot. "No. It's just that I'm really tried after that one-on-one with Troy. It's been a while since I've played that hard."

"Why didn't you just say so? We'll leave you alone if all you want to do is sleep."

Gabriella smiled out of relief. "Thanks guys. I'll see you in the morning. If mom calls tell her that I'm doing good."

Her brothers shuffled out of the room all wishing her a goodnight. With a sigh of relief she shut and locked the door while Troy opened up the bathroom door.

"That was close." He said.

"You have no idea." She agreed. "Good thing they're all tired enough to believe that stuff about me being really tried." She sat down on Troy's bed.

Troy took a seat next to her. "It's cool that they care for you like that though. Kind of like you got your own secret service."

"I think the president gets more social freedoms than I do." She said, smiling. "I can't wait till they start to move out."

"They all still live at home? Even the ones in college?"

She nodded. "It's cheaper for them to live at home with no rent and free food then to live anywhere else. But they do have to share a room. Which can be quite entertaining at times."

Troy smiled at her. "I bet. So do you want to watch a movie anyways?"

She nodded her head. "Sure." They both scooted back to the headboard of Troy's bed. After their last conversation Gabriella wondered how she could have ever considered that the boy sitting a mere eight inches away from her was an arrogant, womanizing, jerk.

--------------------

Gabriella hugged her extra large pillow tighter to her. She slowly breath the smell of comfort and warmth in and out. Her eyes slowly and reluctantly fluttered open. Her eyes stared at the wall as her head rested on her hard comfortable pillow. Gabriella hugged to closer to her body causing it to move.

She sat us with a start to see that the pillow she was cuddling with was her roommate. "Oh my God!" she said frantically. "Troy wake up." She said shaking his leg.

Troy sleepily looked at Gabriella. "Morning." He said as he stretched himself out. "What's wrong?" he asked, noticing her worried expression. "Oh my gosh! After you fell asleep I swear I was going to crash in the other bed, but I guess I fell asleep too…"

"What time is it?" she asked.

Troy glanced over at the clock. "Almost 8:30."

Gabriella jumped off of the bed and ripped her suitcase open. "The bus leaves for the today's games at 8:30!"

Troy's mouth dropped. "Shit." He grabbed him own bag and rummaged through it "I'm sorry I fell asleep Gabriella. I should have set the alarm of something after you fell asleep. I mean it's kind of my fault that you're stuck with me since I gave Taylor the idea to switch rooms…."

"You what?" she exclaimed as she ran into the bathroom holding a change of clothes.

Troy pulled his shirt over his head and pulled on an red East High sweatshirt after it. "I wanted to get to know you better and since you never talk to me voluntarily I thought this would be a good opportunity."

She walked out of the bathroom in a fitted black shirt and a new pair of jeans. "I can't believe you did that." She muttered as she stuffed her clothes into her bag and pulled her hair up into a pony tail.

Troy pulled a pair of sweats on over his shorts. "I'm sorry, but I wanted to get to know you. Like I said last night, you're unlike any other girl I've ever met."

Gabriella spun around to meet his sharp blue eyes. Standing up on her toes and kissed him on the cheek. "In a weird way, it's kind of sweet." Troy stood in front of her with a goofy grin on his face. "Have your bag?"

He grabbed his red and white duffle bag and opened the door. "After you."

Gabriella smiled and led the way to the elevator. As they stood in the elevator, smiling, she hugged her arms tight around herself.

Troy pulled a white sweatshirt out of his bag. "Here." He said, handing her the sweatshirt.

"Thanks," she smiled. "But doesn't it say Bolton on it?"

"The only one that doesn't." he gleamed at her. "And you're welcome."

As the elevator door opened they say Chad and Taylor waiting for them.

"Where were you guys?" she asked, grabbing her friend's arm. "Coach was just about ready to send out a search party."

"Sorry." She apologized as Troy ran ahead with Chad. "But we fell asleep before we could set the alarm."

"Well you're lucky that Scott and Trevor aren't going to the school until the games start because Luke looks furious."

Gabriella's face fell. "Has he been giving you a bad time?"

"Hardly. But I did come up with a story of why both mine and Chad's roommates were missing. It seemed to get him off my back."

"Troy, Gabriella, nice of you two to finally join us." Coach Bolton said as they entered the hotel lobby.

Gabriella blushed, "Sorry Coach."

"Sorry Dad." Troy murmured as he joined up with some other teammates.

"Let's go." He ordered and the team followed.

Luke grabbed Gabriella's arm. "Gabriella where were you?" he asked sternly.

"In my room. I was running late so I told Taylor to go on ahead without me and then when I finally got to the elevator I realized that I would need a sweatshirt so I had to run all the way back and grab one."

He looked down at the white sweatshirt in her hand. "Who's is that?" he asked at he grabbed it, looking for the name. "It doesn't have a name."

"It, uh, It's, um, Kevin's." she spat out. "You know the freshman team never gets names on their sweatshirts."

"I didn't know he had a white one."

Gabriella nodded her head. "Yep, it's new and I liked it so I stole it. You won't tell him will you?"

Luke shook his head. "Course I wont. But you know I had a sweatshirt you could have barrowed."

"I swim in your sweatshirts." She told him. "Kevin's aren't too too big on me."

Luke nodded his head and caught up with his friends. Gabriella looked at Taylor and sighed. They had gotten away with it.

* * *

**You guys are absolutely amazing reviewers! 76 for only four chapters is so great!**

**And I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. It, obviously, showed a different side to Troy and a softer side of Gabriella.**


	6. Do you like him?

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 6: Do you like him?**

Gabriella sat on her bed, smiling. She had been smiling since her Friday night game with Troy. The game that led to him pulling back his hard, jerk exterior to reveal a side of his that she was sure that no one else had seen. By the time they had to leave Sunday morning, she had wanted to kiss again. A feeling that had started showing itself more and more over the weekend.

"Gabriella, sweetie!" she heard her mom call from the floor below. "It's time for school. You better hurry up if you want a ride."

Gabriella floated off of her bed to the mirror that stood above her dresser. For the first time she checked her hair to make sure it was all in place; she checked her make-up to make sure that it was flawless and has the appearance of being barely there; she checked her outfit to make sure that her light blue top looked good with her jeans and black shoes. This was the first time she went to school and actually cared about her appearance towards others.

Happily, she trotted down the stairs. Her happiness and her outward appearance did not go unnoticed by her three brothers standing by the door.

"What's up with you?" Kevin asked as he looked her up and down. "You're all happy and…"

"You look nice and…" Luke added as he also looked at her.

"You smell like a strawberry milkshake." Cole crumpled his nose. "What's going on?"

Gabriella's eyes slightly widened. "I just thought it was time for a change is all." She said in a small voice.

Cole shrugged, unconvinced, and left for the car. Gabriella hurried after him with Luke and Kevin following. She knew that once the car doors were shut the interrogation would begin. Her only hope was to lie through her teeth to keep Troy from getting pummeled.

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People were scattered around the hallway as Gabriella made her way to lunch. She was at least ten minutes late which meant she would most likely be stuck with meatloaf and grape soda with a side of stale chips. Sighing, she knew there would no point in eating until she got home. Her pace slowed while her eyes wandered over the people she passed. To her left were Junior Amber Colton and her boyfriend of the month Senior Brad Taylor. Gabriella had known Amber almost their whole lives and she had never had a boyfriend for longer than four weeks. As her eyes flicked away from them when Brad found it necessary to move his hand up her skirt Gabriella felt a hand grip her arm and pull her into the nearest closet.

The door closed behind them and she looked up at who had grabbed her. Even through the darkness she could see two blue eyes shimmering down at her. "Troy." She breathed in a smile.

In return Troy grabbed Gabriella's hips and lifted her onto the small counter to see her face to face before pressing his mouth against hers.

Startled, Gabriella slowly slid her hands up his chest. She could feel his toned abs and his defined chest under his shirt. As Troy wrapped his arms around her waist she could feel the pressure of his tongue against her lips. As soon as his tongue entered her mouth a surge of lust and pleasure ran through her body. Unlike the last one, she wanted this kiss. She wanted him to want her. Gabriella's hands gripped the looseness of his shirt for stability as she could feel her body growing weaker with pleasure. As she danced her tongue along Troy's the need to touch his soft face entered her. Gabriella's grazed her arm up his torso, but he pulled away before her desire could be fulfilled.

"Told you I'd kiss you later." He whispered into her ear. He quickly moved his mouth back to hers and kissed her carelessly before exiting the closet.

Gabriella slowly moved her hand up to her mouth and lightly touched her own red, throbbing lips. "What the hell just happened." She muttered barely above a whisper.

Stunned and confused she made her way out of the closet, hoping to catch Troy in the hallway. But the only people left in the hallway were Amber Colton and Brad Taylor. Her head spinning, she started her walk back to the cafeteria to get a lunch she was sure she wouldn't be able to stomach.

As soon as she reached the red doors Taylor appeared, linking her arm with Gabriella's. "So lunch today was totally gross. You should be glad you skipped it. But I did snag you a cookie."

Gabriella forced a smile. "That's great Tay. Have you seen Tr- Chad?" she realized she couldn't ask for Troy.

"Yeah. He was at lunch with the usually lunk-heads." Taylor said nonchalantly. "But I haven't seen Troy all day."

"What makes you think I am looking for Troy?" Gabriella asked in her best innocent act.

"Oh come on Gabriella!" she groaned. "You two were in a hotel room together for the whole weekend and expect me to believe nothing happened? I know something happened. It's totally fate!"

Gabriella sighed. "If it is fate - which I'm not saying it is – he has a really weird sense of humor."

--------------------

She couldn't concentrate on math. Or English. Or any subject for that matter. Her mind kept replaying it over and over again. Troy had kissed her. Troy Bolton had kissed her slightly nerdy self, again. The second time was immensely better than the first. She was somewhat prepared for him this time. She knew that he liked to gently bit her bottom lip before sliding his tongue into her mouth. She knew that his left hand liked to make small designs on the skin of her back. She knew that when she pulled him closer to her a groan would rumble in the back on his throat. But none of this mattered. He had no right to kiss her, again.

Gabriella shoved her open books off of her lap as she slowly got out of bed. Hoping food would help her mind leave the mouth of Troy, she swung open her door. At the end of the staircase was Luke with his back to her. Kevin was standing opposite him.

"Hey man, when did you order that white sweatshirt?" Luke asked, unaware of his sister.

Gabriella's eyes widened in fear.

"What white sweatshirt?" Kevin asked truly confused by the question.

"Your white basketball one. Gabriella said you just got it and she stole it for the trip." Luke explained. "She not give it back yet?"

Gabriella desperately flailed her arms above her head to get Kevin's attention. As his gaze landed on her she swung her hands back and forth; the sibling single to lie.

"Uh no…" he said still looking past Luke. "She hasn't given it back yet…"

"Oh well don't tell her I asked about it. I wasn't supposed to tell you that I knew that she sole it."

Kevin walked up to his brother and slapped him on the back. "No problem." He continued past him, glared at Gabriella. Passing her as well, he walked into his sister's bedroom. Gabriella followed and watched him pick up the white sweatshirt sitting on her dresser. "Hmmm, this sure is a nice sweatshirt."

"Kevin…" she groaned reaching for the sweatshirt. But even though he was younger, he was still taller. He held it out of her reach.

"I should wear it to school tomorrow, don't you think? Seeing how it is mine."

"Kevin!" Gabriella continued to reach for the sweatshirt. "Just give it back to me and we can forget about it."

"Look Gabs, we both know that this isn't mine and it sure as hell isn't yours. So let's move onto who's is this?"

"Kevin!" she punched her brother in the stomach causing his arm to drop. "Thank you." She said as she grabbed the sweatshirt.

Kevin held his stomach in pain. "Do you like him?" he asked.

Gabriella shifted uncomfortably. "I don't know. He's not exactly the easiest person to figure out, or get to know."

"Well whoever it is, you just better stay away from him." He warned her.

"I'm not going to have my little brother tell me what to do."

"You stay away and this stays between us, got it?"

Gabriella sighed heavily. "Yeah, between us."

She bumped her fists with her brother before he left the room. After her door shut, Gabriella looked down at the white ball of comfort she held in her hands. Even though it was an arm's length away, it still smelled like him. Why did he have to smell so good?

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For the first time in three days Gabriella was able to focus on something other than Troy's kiss. As she sat in her usual secluded spot in the library, her thoughts were entranced by Jane Austin.

"Knew I'd find you here." A sultry voice announced.

Gabriella kept her eyes focused on the book, determined not to look at him. "What do you want Troy?"

He felt the couch next to her sink as he sat down next to her. "Isn't that kind of obvious? I want you."

"This may be a surprise to you, but you don't always get everything you want." She said sternly, her eyes still focused on her book. "Even if you are a high school God."

"But the thing is, I know you want me too."

She rolled her eyes. "And what gave you that idea?"

"You kissed me back." He said simply, his gaze not leaving the side of her face. "And you haven't turned the page since I've been here."

Gabriella slammed her book shut as turned her fierce gaze on him. "As we've already discussed, kissing doesn't mean anything."

Troy slid a hand onto her knee. "Look Gabriella, I know you want me. I saw the way you looked at me when we were at the hotel."

Gabriella grabbed Troy's hand and shoved it off of her knee. "Go practice your free throws." She sneered at him before stalking off with her book leaving Troy alone in the library.

She stomped down the halls, not caring who looked at her or what they thought of her. Her only concern was getting as far away from him as possible. Gabriella made a sharp turn into a room guarded by a think metal door. In the boy's locker room she saw the basketball players walking around in their red towels, hollering as they saw her. She weaved her way in and out of the lockers.

"I need to talk to you." Gabriella gripped Chad's shirt and pulled him into Coach Bolton's empty office.

Once the door shut, Chad exploded. "Are you out of your mind? Luke is here in the locker room! Do you know what he would do if he saw you in here?"

"Chad, I have a slightly bigger problem than an overprotective brother." She told him. "You're best friend kissed me again."

"When?" Chad asked as he sat himself on the desk.

"Monday. But then there is more to it."

Chad's eyes widened. "Did you guys…?"

Her mouth fell. "No! Ew, Chad! How could you think I would do that?"

"Well it is Troy, I mean it's not like he's a virgin."

She put her hand up. "I don't need to hear that right now. What I was talking about was at the hotel he changed."

"Changed clothes?"

"No." she told him. "He was nice to me and talking to me like I was a person. Not just a piece of meat. He wasn't a jerk."

"And then on Monday he kissed you?" Chad asked.

She nodded her head. "And then today he's acting all like a jerk again. What the hell is wrong with him?"

"Well, I, um, he's…uh," he muttered. "I don't know. I mean as far as I know he's pretty arrogant around girls and that's it."

She pouted. "You're no help."

"And this is something you really should talk to Taylor about."

"I can't! She thinks Troy and I are 'written in the stars' and are 'meant to be together'. She would tell me to ignore the ass hole side of Troy and just focus on the good when, in fact, she hates him almost as much as I do at the moment."

"What the hell is going on?" a deep voice boomed behind Gabriella. Chad jumped off the desk and Gabriella spun around to see Coach Bolton standing in the doorway. "Gabriella! Danforth! Detention and get out of my office!"

* * *

**Oh my gosh, you all are such amazing reviewers that I just had to update! I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. I'm a little on up in the air about it, but you guys let me know what you think.**


	7. Fancy meeting you here

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 7: Fancy meeting you here**

Gabriella tiredly pushed open her front door. Detention had set her back three hours. She saw three people approach her as she made her entrance. "Whatever comment you guys have, you can say it to Sarah. I have homework." Gabriella marched past her brothers and into her room. She sat herself upon her bed and took out her math book.

"Sweetie?" a light knock came at her door as her mom entered. "Is everything all right?"

"Just take a guess, Mom." She muttered.

"What did your brothers do this time?" she asked. "Are they still bugging you about boys? I thought they were just starting to leave you alone about that."

"It's not the guys." Gabriella told her mom. "I just got detention because of something stupid."

"Honey, I'm sorry. But I knew you'd have to get detention sometime, it's a Montez family tradition." Gabriella giggled as screams came from downstairs. "That must mean that a game is on or one of them is getting sat on. We'll talk after dinner." Her mom kissed the top of Gabriella's head before leaving.

"By the way, the guy that I think I like is a conceited jerk who, I think, is acting all sweet and nice just so he can get in my pants. And all of this practically confirmed by his best friend in detention today. Plus Kevin has the perfect opportunity to blackmail me any time he wants and I still have Troy's sweatshirt." She said to an empty room. "But other than that everything is just dandy."

Scribbling problems in her notebook she heard a stampede run past her door multiple times before someone finally opened her door. "Hey! Ultimate Frisbee in the back yard!" Cole told her.

"You guys are fine without me." she muttered as she continued to solve equations.

"Gabriella without you we're only seven. We need you." He said. "And you love Ultimate Frisbee. Almost as much as basketball."

"Cole, I'm really not in the mood to do anything after that detention."

"So it was detention that you were doing after school?" Gabriella nodded. He let out a sigh of relief. "That's a relief. We were all convinced that you were out with Bolton. Luke said you have been all he has been able to talk about and he missed practice today. So we all thought…"

"That I would run off and have a fling with him?" Cole nodded. "Trust me. That is the last thing I want to do right now."

Just as soon as Cole smiled, a rock hit her window. "You guys coming of what?"

Cole raised his eyebrows at his sister. She sighed and set down her book. "Let's go." She followed her brother out the door, down the stairs, and into the backyard. Gabriella found herself on a team with Trevor, Luke, and Jason before their mom had called them in for dinner

"But Mom!" Kevin groaned. "We just started!"

"Dinner! Now!" she barked at her kids. They obediently dropped the Frisbee and marched inside the house. "Before we start eating I just wanted to tell you guys that I have invited one of Kevin's classmates and her family over for dinner tomorrow night. She's new to the school and I thought it would be nice for you all to meet her."

"Mom, I think the question is, how did you meet her?" Luke asked curiously.

"Yeah, did Kevin introduce you?" Scott asked. "Make sure that you liked his girlfriend."

Kevin blushed, but their mom didn't notice. "I met her and her aunt at the last basketball game. And she's a very big basketball fan, so I'm sure you'll all get along just fine."

"Something tells me that Kevin already gets along with her just fine." Trevor muttered. It caused him to get a slap on the back of the head from their mom. The rest of the table laughed as Kevin continued to blush.

After dinner Kevin cornered Gabriella as they headed outside to finish their game. "I need to talk to you."

"Obviously." She said. "And you also need a breath mint."

He rolled his eyes and continued with what he was starting to say. "The girl coming over tomorrow is Angela. She just moved in with her aunt and uncle and she is totally fine."

"So you do know the girl." Gabriella said smiling.

"But at school all the guys in my grade, plus a ton of sophomores, are all over her. So at school, I don't have a chance."

"You set it up so they would meet." Gabriella said, astonished. "And you knew that mom would invite them to dinner and that's when you can get some alone time with her. Very clever Kev. I'm impressed."

He smiled. "Thanks. Now I know that Mom is going to have you give her a tour of the house and I need you to make sure that I am also giving that tour."

"Why would I do that?"

"Because she's hot enough for both Cole and Luke to consider dating a down; or at least consider making out with her. And I want to make sure that I am the one that she gets to know."

"That's all very nice but it still doesn't answer my question."

"You want everyone to find out about that mysterious white sweatshirt that is still in your room?" his eyebrows raised.

Gabriella's eyes narrowed. "Fine. I'll help you."

Kevin smiled. "Thanks sis. You're a true romantic."

She rolled her eyes and pushed him down the porch stairs into the backyard.

--------------------

Gabriella bounced up to Kevin in the hallway before class started. Gripping his arm, she said, "So show me who Angela is."

"Why should I?" he asked. "And could you let go?"

She glared at him. "If I am going to help you then I at least want to know who she is."

"If you let go then I'll tell you." Gabriella obediently let go of his arm. "Gabs, you really need to cut your nails."

"So show me who she is." She ordered him.

Kevin looked down the hall and pointed to a petite girl with dirty blonde hair and bright blue eyes. "That's her." He said, smiling.

Gabriella gaped. "She's in my Calculus class." She exclaimed, "I bet all those senior guys did not know she was a freshman."

"And that's why I need you to make sure that we get alone somehow." Kevin told her.

"Yeah, yeah, I get it. But as far as I can tell she's pretty smart. So you better have more to talk about than sports and food."

His face fell. "Where do I find out what to talk about?" he asked in panic.

"Try one of her friends."

Kevin nodded energetically "Yeah, that will work, Thanks Gabs." He ran down the hall leaving Gabriella smiling.

She turned her head down and walked down the hall in a silent happiness. She was happy to help Kevin came to her for girl advice and not one of her other idiot brothers. Her thought were abruptly cut off by a full body smack into another person.

"Gabriella, what a surprise." She looked up to see him staring at her with that smirk.

She rolled her eyes. "Troy, what an ass hole." She matched his tone.

He shook a finger in front of her face. "Now that's not very nice."

"Well, my mother told me to never tell a lie. So I guess you're stuck." She tried to brush past him, but found herself trapped up against the lockers.

He smiled at her. "Looks like you're stuck too." He let his hand rest on the lockers she was pressed against.

Gabriella glared at him. "Just let me go."

"As you frequently like to point out, I don't have you. Which I still can't figure out why. I mean, I am Troy after all. Third coolest guy in school right after your brothers."

"Troy, do you know what modesty is?"

His eyes flicked over her. "Should I?"

Her eyes rolled again. "Find a dictionary, look it up, and then hit yourself in the head with it."

Troy laughed. "Have you ever thought about going out for the Drama Club?" Gabriella gave him a questioning look. "You are such a great actress. I mean for a second there I almost believed that you didn't like me."

Gabriella dropped her voice down to a whisper as she felt the eyes of passing students fall on them. "Why are you acting like this?"

"Honey, this is who I am. You and I both know that. And we both know that it wont be much longer until you fall right into my arms." With each word he leaned closer and closer to her.

She could feel his hot breath on her mouth. She knew that he wanted to kiss her; she could see it in his eyes. With one quick movement she lifted up her foot and rammed in on top of his. Troy's weight fell to his other foot, leaving an opening for Gabriella to leave.

She leaned close to him and whispered into his ear. "I used to think that our little bickering matches were kind of fun. But don't ever talk to me like I'm just some piece of ass that you want to get with ever again."

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Gabriella ran around the house picking up anything that would be uninviting to guest, just as her mother had instructed. As usual, the night that their mother had invited company over, everything was in chaos. Gabriella had been forced to change three times as well as clean up any place the guests might see. Her dad, Scott, and Trevor were being fashionably late getting home to avoid doing any work. Her mom was in the kitchen trying to get the meal perfect. Ian and Jason were tucked away in a room until the company would arrive. Kevin was cleaning up the yard. Cole was trying his best to her their mom in the kitchen. And Luke was late because of basketball practice.

"Cole don't put the cheese on the pasta yet!" her mother screeched from the kitchen. "It will harden and then be no good!"

"Sorry mom." Cole apologized. "It looked done and I just thought…"

"Don't think!" her mother ordered. "Just do as I say. Gabriella where are Scott and Trevor?"

Gabriella's head snapped up. "I think they're pulling up the driveway right now. And I think dad is with them too."

Her mom sighed in relief. "Thank goodness. Tell them to shower quickly and get ready before they show up. I'm going to go check on Kevin."

"Mom, don't leave me alone with all the food! What if it burns?" Cole yelled as he watched his mother head towards the backyard.

As three of her family members entered she opened her mouth to replay the news her mother had said.

"Hi honey." Her father kissed her on the head before running upstairs.

"Gabs, we know." Scott said. "Go clean up."

"Get changed and don't be late." Trevor added.

Gabriella sighed. "Why does she even tell me to tell you guys stuff when she know that you know it already."

"She's stressed." Trevor told her.

"Company has always made her a little tense." Scott added. "But no need to tell you that. You get to be the one whose home all afternoon with her."

Gabriella glared at her brothers. "Just go get ready. And make sure that Ian and Jason are still decent."

They smiled at her and ran up the stairs.

She heard the front door open and slam shut. "Now Gabs you remember the plan?" Kevin asked as he watched his sister run around the living room.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tour of the house, you come along, I suddenly remember something, leave you two alone, blah blah blah."

"Oh come on, you're a better actor than that!"

She snorted. "So I've been told." She turned to face him. "Mom is running around the back yard looking for you. Go find her and tell her that Cole needs her help in the kitchen."

He nodded and ran through the kitchen and out the back door. Once again, the front door opened and slammed.

"Gabriella the weirdest thing happened to me today." Luke said as he approached her.

"You got an A?"

"Someone asked me if I was the brother of Gabriella Montez." He told her. "Now why would somebody ask me that? Nobody knows you!"

"Thanks for the vote of confidence bro." she sneered as the doorbell rang. She shoved a pile of _Sports Illustrated_ into his stomach. "That's them, now go change!"

"We are not done with this conversation!" he yelled as she pushed him up the stairs. "Something happened at school today and I'm going to find out what it was."

Once her brother was out of sight she turned to the front door and straightened out the skirt her mother had picked out for her to wear. Catching her breath she walked to the door and put on a smile.

"Hello!" she said cheerily as she opened the door. "Come on in. Everybody will be down in one quick minute."

First she watched Angela walk through the door with an older lady that Gabriella vaguely recognized behind her. Not a second later Coach Bolton walked through the door with another young man following him, causing Gabriella's mouth to drop.

"Hey there Gabriella." Smiled Troy. "Fancy meeting you here."

* * *

**I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! I really had a fun time writing it.**

**It might be a while before my next update since school is starting in a few weeks and I have a ton of stuff to do to get ready.**


	8. I'm not talking to you

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 8: I'm not talking to you**

Gabriella's mouth opened and closed a couple of times, but nothing came out. Troy continued to smile at her. "Troy…" she stammered. "You're here…in my house."

"Pretty good surprise, don't you think?" he said as he looked Gabriella up and down. She wore a floral skirt with a fitted, pink shirt.

"Um, yeah. A pretty big surprise." She said, still in shock.

"So Gabriella, where is the rest of your family?" Coach Bolton asked.

She ripped her eyes away from his grin, "Um, they are just getting everything ready. They should be down here any moment."

"Welcome!" her mom screeched from behind them with Kevin and Cole in tow. "So sorry we're late. So many kids, so little time."

"Not a problem." Mrs. Bolton said. "Where is the rest of your family?"

"Right here!" Gabriella's dad announced as he trotted down the stairs with Trevor, Scott, Luke, Ian, and Jason following.

"I think that's a new record." Gabriella muttered to Scott.

"We just keep getting better and better." He whispered as he straightened his shirt.

"More like faster."

"Well, this is my husband, Victor." Gabriella's mom started the introductions. "And here you probably already know Trevor, Scott, and Luke." Each of her brothers nodded as their name was called. "And we have Cole, Gabriella, Kevin, Ian, and our littlest Jason."

"Hey little buddy." Troy leaned down to Jason. "How old are you?"

"You're breath smells funny." Jason announced. Troy flushed and returned to his upright position.

"So Cole, not a basketball player?" Coach Bolton noted.

"I'm more of a baseball kind of guy." Cole told him. "I'm on the team with Chad."

He nodded in approval before addressing her two older brothers while Troy talked to the other ones. Gabriella quickly maneuvered her way to her mother's side.

"Hey mom, you know how I always give the tour of the house." She whispered. "Maybe Kevin should do it instead. I mean Angela is in his grade."

"What a lovely idea Gabriella!" he mother exclaimed quietly. "You'll both give the tour."

Gabriella's eyes widened. "What?"

"Well you're in Troy's grade aren't you? And it won't kill you to be a little more social."

Gabriella groaned as her mother moved to the middle of the group.

"Why don't Kevin and Gabriella give Troy and Angela a tour of the house while the rest of us move into the living room and get to know each other a little before dinner."

All of her brother's eyes fell upon Gabriella as Troy smirked at her mother's announcement. The four kids silently walked into the kitchen, "So this is our kitchen. It's amazing that all of us can fit in here to eat."

"If I'm not mistaken, it looked like you had a pretty good sized backyard. Why doesn't Kevin show Angie the house while you take me on a tour of the backyard?" Troy suggested.

"Sounds good to me." Kevin said automatically. "There is a back staircase over here, so we don't have to walk through everyone again." Kevin said as he led Angela to the stairs. He gave Gabriella a quick thumbs up and she rolled her eyes.

Troy stood next to Gabriella and smiled. "That was a lot easier than I thought it would be."

"Why did you do that?" Gabriella snipped at him.

"Kevin obviously wanted to be alone with Angie. I just thought I'd help move things along." Gabriella rolled her eyes. "So what about that tour?"

He eyes narrowed on him. "Fine." She walked out the backdoor with Troy closely following. "This is the backyard."

"You want me to give the tour myself?" he asked.

Gabriella groaned. "Come on." Gabriella walked down the stairs and to the middle of her yard. "So this is the backyard. It's big and green. Not-"

Troy pressed him mouth against Gabriella's, taking her by surprise. Her hands lightly rested on his chest as his hands cupped her face. She let his tongue enter her mouth and graze her own before she forcefully pushed him away.

"What's wrong?" Troy asked as he was forced an arm's length away from her.

"This! Us kissing! It's wrong!" she told him.

"I thought we've already decided that kissing doesn't mean anything." He inched closer to her and slid an arm around hr waist. "So why stop now?"

She pushed him off of her. "You're a complete idiot if you think that kissing doesn't mean anything! I mean it may mean nothing to you, but to me it means something and you're treating it like a game. You have this bizarre need to prove that I'll fall for you and that's not okay with me."

"You're the one that said kissing doesn't mean anything." He snapped at her.

"Yeah, well, I lied. We all do it. You do it enough for the entire male population of the school!"

"And what is that supposed to mean?" Troy snarled at Gabriella.

Gabriella's anger grew. "You are a total jerk to me right when you meet me and continue being a jerk until Santa Fe where you suddenly become nice and real and make me think that there could possibly be some good down inside of you. But that must have been a fluke or something because the next time we see each other you're back to being the ass hole that everyone knows you to be." She took a deep breath. "I don't know who the real you is and you expect me to fall for you. That's like the ultimate form of lying."

"Like you're so perfect. Half the time I see you, you're yelling at me and the other time you're offended by me, and then in Santa Fe you seemed like you somewhat cared for me."

"How? By not forcing you to jump out the window?"

"For the first time you treated me like a genuine friend and that made me want to show you the real me. But obviously that was a mistake because you are clearly psychotic."

"I'm psychotic?" she exclaimed. "You're the one who keeps flip flopping personalities. You think you're some poor unfortunate soul when you have a prefect life."

"You know nothing about my life." He said sternly. "And don't even for one second think you know how my life works when the truth is you have no idea." He stormed back into the house almost knocking Kevin over.

"Hey Gabs, why is Troy all mad?" Kevin asked as he walked into the backyard.

"Tell mom that I'm taking the keys and going to Taylor's and I'm sorry about missing the dinner."

"Gabs!" Kevin called after her, but she was already making her way towards the car.

-------------------

Gabriella knocked on Taylor's door furiously.

"Gabriella, hello." Her mom answered the door.

"Oh! Hi Mrs. McKessie. Is Taylor here? I really need to talk to her." Gabriella blurted out.

"Sorry Gabriella, but she's at Chad's house." Her mom said politely.

She nodded her head. "Thanks." Gabriella ran down the driveway and jumped back into her car. She quickly drove through the neighborhood making her way to Chad's house.

"Chad! Open Up!" Gabriella screeched as she banged on the door.

"You just missed Taylor." He said opening his door. "And your screeches have gotten like five levels higher since last time."

"I kind of realized that talking to Taylor would be a bad idea since she doesn't really know anything about, well, him." She told him. "And how did you know I was looking for her?"

"Troy told me about the dinner. I kind of figured you'd come around sooner or later."

"How did you know about the dinner?"

"Chad who was at the door?" bellowed from behind Chad.

Her eyes narrowed and pushed the door open. Chad stepped aside to reveal Troy sitting on Chad's couch. "You were going to let me rant about him, weren't you?"

Chad shrugged, "Kind of."

Gabriella glared at him. "I'm not talking to you anymore." She turned on her heel and started to walk back to her car.

"Gabi!" Chad grabbed her arm and pulled her into the house. "You two obviously have something to talk about. My parents are out of town and I'm going to go surprise Taylor. By the time I get back, you guys better have worked something out." Chad told them. "I'm going to need these." He took the keys out of Gabriella's hand and left.

"Why does it feel like we just got put in a timeout?" Troy asked, looking up at Gabriella.

She whipped her head around to look at him. "I'm not talking to you." She said stiffly and took a seat on the opposite side of the couch.

"How can you be mad at me?" Troy asked.

"You insulted me!" she spat at him.

"Like you didn't insult me."

Her eyes focused on him. "Well you deserved it, the way you've been yanking me up and down on an emotional yoyo. And I'm not talking to you so stop talking to me." she crossed her arms over her chest and sat back on the couch. Troy watched her and grinned. "And what did you mean when you said that I knew nothing about your life?" she turned to face him.

"I thought you weren't talking to me." he pointed out.

Gabriella turned away from him again. "Right. I'm not talking to you."

"So you've said." Troy leaded back on the couch and flicked on the TV. He channeled surfed until he reached a basketball game.

"Is all you think about is basketball?" she asked as her eyes watched the players on the screen.

"Would you rather I watch bowling." He asked her.

"No. It's just that your life seems to revolve around basketball. Even my brothers have more to them than the game."

"You know you are really good at that whole not talking thing." Troy smirked, looking at Gabriella.

"Right. I'm not talking to you." She crossed her arms tighter over her chest, watching Troy watch the game. "Turn it up."

Troy smiled and turned up the volume. "I'll go make us some popcorn since both of us missed dinner." He pushed himself off the couch and scooted past Gabriella who stayed quiet.

--------------------

Chad opened the front door to his house. "We get everything patched up?" he asked.

"Thank God!" Gabriella jumped off the couch and grabbed her keys form Chad's hand and ran out the door,

"I'm guessing you two didn't work things out." Chad said as he sat next to Troy on the couch.

"She said she wasn't talking to me four times before she actually shut up. Even then she still argued with me about the game."

Chad laughed. "Yeah, she's not really good at keeping her mouth shut."

Troy grinned. "I've realized. So why did you take her car?"

"I needed one. Rents are gone and I don't have my own BMW and I didn't want to walk to Taylor's."

"So I'm stuck here until I can find someone to give me a ride home."

Chad nodded his head. "Yep."

"It's not like anyone will notice I'm gone so I guess I can chill here for a while." Troy made himself comfortable on the couch for the night.

The next morning he woke to a loud ringing. "Chad, answer the phone!"

"I'll bet you fifty bucks it's for you." Chad yelled from his bedroom.

Tory grumbled and searched blindly for the phone. "Hello?"

"Troy!" she yelled through the receiver. "Where the hell are you?"

He sighed. "Good morning to you too Angie. How's life."

"Well after you stormed out of the Montez house you're parents were upset for about ten minutes until the food came and then they forgot. Then they didn't realize again till about thirty minutes ago when you missed a 7 am work out with your dad. He went ballistic and woke me up with all of his yelling."

"Wouldn't expect anymore of them." Troy said.

"Yeah well now your dad is freaking out and ahs ordered me to find you." She told him. "So you're at Chad's?"

Troy yawned. "Yeah." He heard a click from the other end. "Angie?" he hung up the phone as his face smashed back into the pillow.

"You owe me fifty bucks." Chad said as he took a seat on the couch. "Who was it?"

"Angela. My dad noticed I was gone." Troy said into the pillow.

Chad clicked on the TV. "7 am workout?"

"Yep." Troy pulled his blanket further over his head and drifted off to the sound to the TV blaring until the doorbell rang twenty minutes later. "Chad!" he groaned.

Chad pushed himself off of the couch. "Another fifty it's for you." he answered the door. "Hi Angela. He's on the couch." Chad let her into him house. "That's 100 bucks!" he yelled before running into him room.

"What's he talking about?" she asked.

"Oh nothing. How did you get here?" he asked curiously.

"I drove." She said casually.

"Angie!" he exclaimed. "You're only 15. You could have wrecked my car."

"Driving is so not hard." She told him. "Besides, how else did you expect me to get you home?"

Troy threw off his blanket and grabbed his eyes. "I'll drive home, thank you."

* * *

**TaDa! There it is. Tell me what you think.**

**Oh and I just started another story called _The Games That Play Us_. It's old, but kind of new. I explain it all over there. Would love it if you could check it out.**


	9. A piece of bacon

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 9: A piece of bacon**

Taylor and Gabriella sat on the gym floor Monday morning. "And you just left? Right in the middle of dinner?" Taylor asked.

"Well dinner hadn't really started yet. But yeah, I left." Gabriella told her. "My brothers were furious."

"And your parents weren't?"

Gabriella shook her head. "My mom thought it was just one of those moments where I needed to be by myself and there was no harm seriously done." She recited. "And she convinced my dad just to let it go. But I was bombarded by the idiot bunch because Troy stormed out too."

"We're you guys together?" Taylor asked hopefully.

"Kind of…" Gabriella told her.

Taylor sighed. "That's a yes or no question. 'Kind of' doesn't cut it."

"Well, Chad stuck us both in his house, but we didn't talk. Unless we were arguing about the game, but that's besides the point."

"What is the point?"

"The point is that Troy has been getting on my nerves more and more so your little fantasy of us getting together so we can go out on double dates will never happen."

Taylor laughed. "We'll see. Troy gets all the girls to fall under his spell. I doubt you are an exception."

"I thought you were on my side!"

"I am. I'm on the side of you that really likes Troy." Taylor smiled brightly at her friend.

"Girls!" the teacher bellowed, "For the next section we will be joining our class with Coach Bolton's boy class."

Taylor raised her hand. "What is the next section?"

"Dance." The teacher announced. "That's why we need the boys."

The girls burst out into chatter. "Dance!" Taylor exclaimed. "This could be kind of fun."

"You only think that because your boyfriend is in Coach Bolton's class."

Taylor beamed at the thought of Chad. "And here comes boyfriend now!" she squealed.

Gabriella turned around and watched the boy's PE class enter the gym. As she watched them walked through the bright red metal doors it appeared, to her, that they were in slow motion. Leading the group was none other than Troy. As Gabriella would expect, he wore an East High Basketball t-shirt with matching shorts and shoes. Behind him followed the majority of the varsity basketball team, along with other boys from various sports. The group was definitely good looking. Gabriella watched as Troy's sharp blue eyes feel upon her.

She instantly blushed after remembering their night together. After an intense argument over the Pistons and the Warriors, she had fallen asleep. Upon waking up, she found that Troy had taken her shoes off and placed a blanket over her. When she finally looked over at him, he was smirking.

Gabriella spun her head around, whipping her hair over her shoulder. "I can't believe we have to learn dance with those guys." She complained softly to Taylor.

"I know, isn't it fabulous!" she exclaimed as she jumped onto her feet.

Gabriella sighed. "Not quite the reaction I was looking for." She pushed herself onto her feet. Suddenly she wished that she had done laundry that weekend and wasn't forced to wear the shortest shorts she had.

"Boys!" Coach Bolton bellowed. Taylor made a slight cough, causing him to turn around and face the girl's class, "And ladies. The principal has decided that the boy's class doesn't need another section of basketball, but a more delicate sport." The boys all rolled their eyes. "And he picked dance…so men, go pick your partner!"

As if it was dinner time at the Montez house after a long day of chores, the boys quickly parted from their group and grabbed a partner. Chad started to make his way through the crowd to Taylor, with close Troy behind him.

"Gabriella?" she felt a tap on her should and spun around.

"Hey Jason." She smiled brightly at him. He was a friend of Chad's, one she had always liked.

"You want to be my partner?"

Gabriella opened her mouth to tell him that she would love to partner with him when she felt an arm settle around her shoulders. "Sorry Jase, she already has a partner. But Kelsi is over there and I think she might have a thing for you."

Jason's eyes brightened. "Really?" he promptly went up to Kelsi and asked her be his partner. Gabriella watched her blush and nod her head before taking his hand.

Troy leaned down to Gabriella's ear. "Looks like we're the only two left." he whispered softly.

Gabriella turned to face him and ripped her arm off of her shoulder. "Why did you do that?"

"I wanted you as my partner." He smirked. "Besides, I gave Jason some confidence to actually ask a chick out instead of just admiring from afar."

"Good deed aside, that was rude."

Troy shrugged. "So you're stuck with me as your partner. A lot worse things can happen."

"Yeah like getting expelled for attempted murder on one of East High's star athletes." She snipped at him.

Troy placed his hand over his heart. "That hurt Gabriella. That really hurt. I don't think I can ever look at you the same way again."

"Good." She said satisfied.

"I'll just have to picture you in your birthday suit." Troy said, smirk gleaming.

Gabriella's eyes grew wide at his comment. She swiftly picked her foot up and jammed it on top of his.

Troy's upper body collapsed as his foot lifted off the ground. "You know that's the second time you've done that and this time it hurt a lot worse." He said in a rough voice.

"Maybe by the third time you'll learn that it's a bad idea to talk to me like some kind of slut." she snipped at him.

Troy slowly returned to full height, "Maybe by the third time you'll finally realize that there is no resisting the charm that is Troy Bolton."

"You call that charm?" she snorted. "It's more like a piece of bacon."

Troy stared at her blankly. "A piece of bacon?" he asked slowly.

"Charm-bracelet-ring-fire-burn-bacon." She told him. "Plus I hate bacon."

Troy smirked. "Your mind is one interesting place."

"And your's is just a big black hole."

Troy opened his mouth to shoot back another retort but was cut off by his father's booming voice. "Who you have chosen as your partner will be your partner for the section and that will be until the principal decides that you guys have experienced enough culture."

Gabriella's head fell backwards and she groaned slightly. "I hate PE."

--------------------

Gabriella stormed up her driveway and slammed her front door shut behind her. Scott approached her with a mouthful of peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

"Hey Gabs, what's up?" he asked, slightly spraying her with food.

She put her hand up to his face. "Don't even talk to me." she said sharply. Gabriella pranced past him and into the kitchen, passing her mom who walked up to her brother.

She slapped Scott on the back of the head. "What did you do this time?"

"I didn't to anything!" he pleaded. "I swear!"

She scowled at him before going back into the kitchen to find her daughter sitting at the counter with an ice cream carton in front of her and a spoon in her mouth.

"Hey mom." Gabriella muttered. "How was work?"

Her mom smiled softly. "I think the more important question is, how was school?"

Gabriella sighed and shoved her spoon into the frozen chocolate. "First period was just really bad and it kind of set a bad mood for the whole day." Her mom raised her eyebrows in disbelief. "The guys didn't do anything."

"The day is still young sweetie." She patted her daughter's knee before walking back into the living room.

"Thanks a lot Gab." Scott muttered as he walked into the kitchen to make himself another sandwich.

Gabriella took a bite of ice cream. "What did I do?" she asked with a mouthful.

"You're attitude got me a slap from mom." He told her. "And her hits are getting harder. But you wouldn't know that because you are the angel daughter."

She smiled slightly. "Sorry that I'm so perfect."

Before her brother could muster up a comeback, Jason ran into the kitchen. His mouth dropped and he walked back out of the kitchen. "Mom! How come Gabriella gets to eat ice cream before dinner."

Scott chuckled. "You could have possibly started World War 3 Miss Perfection."

"We are way past World War 3." She snorted. "We're on like World War Three Million."

"That couldn't be more true." Trevor said taking a seat next to his sister. "I heard that you had a rough day."

Scott took a bite of his new sandwich. "She can't have a rough day. She's prefect." He said as he walked around them. "I'll be outside. Call me when dinner's ready."

Gabriella and Trevor watched him run out to the backyard. Trevor turned back to Gabriella. "So, bad day?"

She took another bite of ice cream. "Kind of. But I can deal with it. Living with you guys for 16 years has prepared me for anything life throws at me."

"Gabriella phone call!" A voice sounded from the basement.

"That's my cue to go play some hoops." Trevor exited from the kitchen.

Gabriella rolled her eyes and reached for the nearest phone. "Hello?" she asked into the receiver as she shoved another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth.

"Why isn't it little miss Gabriella Montez." A voice hummed from the other end.

Her mouth fell open and her spoon dropped into the carton. "Are you seriously calling my house?"

"No, you are just so infatuated with me that you are wishing that I would call you." Troy said.

Gabriella could feel his smirk through the phone. "Try again."

"My dad wanted me to call and tell you that we made it to State."

"Are you implying that I didn't know that? I was at the game when it was announced to the entire gym. And I was at school the next day when it was plastered all over the hallways, the newspaper, and blaster over the intercom."

"He seems to think that you are a decent manager and has invited you to join the team on the two week, ten game trip." He told her.

"And why couldn't Luke have told me this?" she asked.

"I volunteered. Thought you would enjoy it more if the news came from me."

Gabriella pulled the phone away from her face and gave it a disgusted look. She clicked it off and went back to eating her ice cream.

"Gabi, you are amazing!" Kevin said as he took a seat next to her at the counter.

"Why can't I mope in peace?" she asked the air in front of her. "And why am I amazing?" she turned her attention to her brother.

"You and Troy ditching the family last Friday at dinner was genius! It gave me and Angela a ton of alone time since everyone was focusing on you two. And today at lunch she asked me to go see Nickleback with her this weekend."

She nodded in improvement. "Nice work little bro. Looks like you are in line to become a boyfriend."

Kevin gleamed. "I know. It's great and I owe it all to you!" he kissed the side of her head before running out to the backyard to share the good news with more of his family members.

Gabriella smiled and shook her head. "So today hasn't been completely sucky. I may have an ass of a dance partner, but I seem to be an angel, perfect, and amazing. Not bad Gabriella, not bad."

Luke raised an eyebrow as he stood in the kitchen doorway. "Who the hell are you talking to?"

Gabriella's head snapped up. "Why can't I eat ice cream in peace?" she asked the ceiling above her.

"Why is my sister a complete psycho who keeps talking her herself?" he slammed a basketball down on the counter causing her eyes to snap towards him. "Let's go join the game outside psycho."

Gabriella grabbed the ice cream carton and shoved it into the freezer. "Why is it that when everyone else compliments me, you insult me?"

"Who cares?" he yelled back at her. "We're going to play basketball. Life's good for everyone!"

She found herself rolling her eyes again. Gabriella followed her brother out to the backyard and was soon involved in an intense game of two-on-two.

* * *

**So I have some kind of sad news. I feel like this story is going nowhere. But that is mainly my fault since I never wrote up a storyline for it like I have done with the other stories I have writen. Because of this I have to take a break from this story to get my thoughts in order so it doesn't end up in a dead end. I'm not sure when I'll be able to get back to writing it because school starts in a week and that is going to take up most of the time I usuallt spend writing (and making videos). I'm sorry that I have to do this, but if I want this story to really suceed I need to take this break.**

**And if you guys have any ideas for this story feel free to tell me about them. Who knows...maybe your idea will spark my imagination and get my creative juices flowing and get me on the path that I have to be on to complete _Life In A Glass House_. (And please don't feel like you have to post an idea. This is just so people who want to post ideas can do it and know that they will be welcomed with open arms.)**

**In the mean time I have two other stories in the works that you guys can check out. Both pretty differnet from this one.**

**First is _Crash Into You_. The thing I like most about this one is that I knew exactly how it was/is going to end before I even started it. It's an AU Troy/Gabriella story where Troy is the older appealing guy who just wants to be who Gabriella needs. And Gabriella is the emotional highschooler who has a love/hate relationship with the drama that surrounds all of her relationships (romantic and not). She's a dancer that comes from a high class society and he's a former baskerball player that is just trying to figure what he wants out of life. I completely adore this story and all the drama that it contains. Plus it was/is my first HSM movie fic and is, so far, the most sucessful. **

**My second one is _The Games That Play Us_. A very AU story that is told through the eyes of Gabriella Montez, a normal teenage girl who's first love is the game of volleyball. It focuses on her friendships with her housemate Chad, her bestfriend Taylor, and the boy that will always understand her, Zeke. In the start she falls for the new jock Ryan who could possibly be the one to sweep her off her feet. As the end of her Sophmore year her dream of becoming the captain of the volleyball team drifts farther away as certain unwanted people drift more into her life than she would ever want. This story is already written, so I update it quite often. I love this one (despite the slow start) and think that it gets so much better near the end. **

**And I also have _He Said, She Said_ (finished). but that story kills me. I probably like it the least because of the way it's written, but I like it the most because of the couples that get together (and the story line is kind of decent. It would have been betetr if I spent more time on it).**

**So, again, sorry that I'll have to put this story on pause for a while, but I hope I have provided you with enough of my other writings that you wont hate me and understand why I have to do this.**

**Oh, and you can also check out my YouTube with a plethera of High School Musical and Hannah Montana videos (with A Cinderella Story, Step Up, Peter Pan, Cory in the House, As The Bell Rings, and Gilmore Girls videos on the way). And you can also check out my second internet home (first being the IMDb Jeremy Sumpter board) FanForum. You can find me at the Jared Padalecki, Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens boards (and hopefully a High School Musical board soon). And if you adore the J.Pad as much as I do, check out Paddywhack Central. An amazing fansite sprouted from a measly comment (made by yours truely) on the Jared board at FanForum. (All links can be found in my profile)**

**Okay, so there was a lot of self pimping in that extremely long AN. I hope you don't mind.**


	10. Like really hate you

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 10: Like really hate you**

The white hallways and the dim lighting made for an eerie feeling. "Chad where are you?" Gabriella asked into her phone. She wandered around the empty hallways of the school. "You told me to meet you after practice."

"I know." He told her. "But I wanted to tell you this on the phone."

Her face scrunched up. "Why…?"

"Tay and I set you up on a blind date." Chad spat it out as fast as he could.

Her jaw fell and her eyes widened. "You did what!" her scream echoed in the hallway. Gabriella spun in a circle looking for the nearest thing to hit. Her object of choice was locker 502. She rammed her foot into the locker, letting out another irritated scream.

"I thought you might take this bad…" Chas sighed on the other end.

"You know how I feel about blind dates!" she screamed.

"I know."

Gabriella started to run around the hallways in search of her so-called friend. "And you know even more how I feel about the guys that Taylor chooses for me." she said angrily. She finally reached the cafeteria balcony where she found Chad sitting the floor below on his phone. "Chad Danforth!" she bellowed. "I am going to kill you."

He quickly turned around to see Gabriella running down the stairs at top speed. "Look Gabriella, I know you're upset but if you would just listen it might sound like a good idea."

"You better hope that heaven has a basketball hoop." She warned before lunging at him.

Chad jumped away from her grasp and made a dash for the outside door. "Seven o'clock sharp! Be ready!" he jumped into his car and sped off.

Gabriella stood at the front of the parking lot trying to catch her breath. "I really need to start working out more." She looked down and saw her throbbing red foot with only a sandal to protect it. "Damn it." She cursed softly and collapsed onto the black pavement. Cradling her foot she held back tears of pain.

A half hour later Gabriella was sitting on her kitchen counter.

Her brother Cole stood with her foot in his hand. "Exactly what did you do to your foot?" he asked as he started to wrap the beige bandage around her small foot.

"I tripped and banged it into something really hard." She lied as the bandage became tighter. "Not too tight." She warned him.

He chuckled. "I think I know what I'm doing Gabs, but thanks."

"Must have been one heck of a fall to cause that much damage." Scott commented. He leaned up against the fridge, observing her injury.

Gabriella was ready to retaliate when a loud crash came from outside. "He did it!" was faintly called as a stampede of feet ran into the kitchen. She lifted her foot up in the air as her two youngest brothers ran past, each holding a football.

"What did you guys break?" she asked.

"Nothing on our house, I swear." Jason said in a panicked voice.

Her eyes widened. "What?"

Ian smacked Jason in the back of the head. "Nice going dumb ass."

"Who are you called dumb ass, dumb ass!" Jason yelled back. The two kids lunged at each other and started to wrestle on the kitchen floor.

Both Cole and Scott let out a heavy sigh before grabbed their brothers before any real damage was done. Cole had Ian and Scott held Jason by his shirt.

Gabriella rubbed her forehead. "Who's house?" Both of the younger kids pointed to the right. "Great…." She hopped off the counter and hobbled over to the other side of the kitchen. She grabbed a blue and gold jar. "This is the broken window fund." She explained. "If whatever you broke costs more than this, you guys are in huge trouble."

"But it wasn't our fault!" Jason yelled.

"The houses are too close together!" Ian added.

Gabriella sighed. "Cole, Scott." Both of her brothers nodded and pushed the kids through the living room and out the front door. The four of them were on their way over to the neighbor's house to tell them what happened. Not once had it been her to take the walk of shame, but she had seen each of her brothers do it dozens of times.

Shuffling up the stairs she saw her clock blinking a red 6:30. Ripping open her closet she pulled out a pair of jeans and a loose blue and pink stripped shirt.

With her clothes changed, she redid her makeup and pulled her hair up into a pony tail. "I hate blind dates." She muttered before grabbing a fleece jacket and making her back down to the living room.

A loud burp greeted her when she reached the couch. "Lovely." She sneered taking a seat next to her brother.

"Why are you so dressed up?" Trevor asked taking another drink of his Mountain Dew.

She glanced down at her outfit. "This is so not dresses up."

"Rephrasing." He said. "Where are you going?"

"Out with Taylor and Chad." Not a lie.

He raised his eye brows. "Anyone else going?"

"Not that I know of." Not too much of a lie.

"You lying?" he asked bluntly.

She scoffed. "No." But that one was a lie. "Look, they're going to be here any minute. I'm going to wait outside." She pushed herself off the couch. "Tell Mom and Dad that I'll be back by curfew and tell Jason and Ian that if they take more money out of the jar than needed then they will be in serious trouble from yours truly."

Trevor sighed. "Another broken window?"

&&&

"Have I mentioned how much I hate you guys?" Taylor and Chad pushed Gabriella into the pizza parlor. "Like really hate you."

"So you've said." Taylor commented. "But you still came."

Chad nodded his head. "And that shows that you are intrigued."

"I may be intrigued, but I still hate you both." Gabriella said grumpily as she sat in the red booth next to Taylor. She turned her attention to Chad who sat across from them. "So who is this guy?"

"So how's that foot?"

She glared at him. "Do you know what happens when a basketball player thoroughly pisses off one of his best friends?"

Chad leaned back and smiled, "No. What?"

"Let's just say that a basketball no longer becomes a friendly object and your jaw may or may not end up wired shut." His smile faded and his eyes narrowed. "So now that we have that taken care of, who is this guy that I supposedly supposed to be on a date with."

A smile spread across Taylor's face. "You're going to love him!"

"I might love him even more if you told me his name." Gabriella said with a fake smile.

"Hey Chad, Taylor. Sorry I'm late." A deep voice called from behind her. Not a few seconds later had a body slid into the booth next to Chad, giving Gabriella a face to match with the profound voice. His face was glowing with soft edges that lined his jaws. A smirk seemed to be permanently plastered to his mouth as his bright eyes stared her down. "You must be my date."

Gabriella shot at death glare at Chad and then at Taylor before pushing herself onto her good foot. She started to hobble out of the restaurant without saying a word.

"Gabriella," a strong hand grabbed her arm and twisted her around. "don't leave." He pleaded.

"And why not?" she asked bitterly. "Give me one good reason I should stay, Troy."

Troy let out a heavy sigh, "Because I like you."

She snorted a laugh, "So you've said. But all of the evidence in the world proves that all you want to do is annoy me and maybe sleep with me."

"Look I know I've been a jerk this past week in PE, but you've got to believe me when I say that's not who I want to be."

"Really? I thought jerk was just your default setting."

Troy let go of her arm, but she didn't move. "You just don't get it! I try so hard to impress you but all you do is tear me down."

"If you think that kissing me whenever you feel like it and playing grab ass while we're dancing is a way to impress me then you're even more messed up than I thought." She trying to move past him but he moved himself in front of her. "You know I'd already be half way home if my stupid foot wasn't hurt."

Troy looked down at her bandaged up foot. "What'd you do to it?" he asked softly.

"I pretended a locker was your face and kicked it as hard as I could." He said with a cynical tone.

Troy sighed again. "Look, all I'm asking for is one night. Just give me one night and if you still hate me, then I'll stay out of your way."

Gabriella crossed her arms across her chest and stared into his eyes. They had lost their initial sparkle, but she felt like they were drilling a hole in her face. "Give me one good reason why I should stay." She repeated herself.

"Because you still have my sweatshirt." He said simply.

Her mouth fell open slightly and her hard stare diminished. "Okay." She muttered. "One night."

Troy held his arms open. "That's all I'm asking for."

She brushed past his and shuffled back to their booth. Gabriella leaned over to Taylor. "You are so going to pay for this." She whispered.

"You'll thank me one day." She said back. "So how do you guys think we're going to do at state?"

Chad's face lit up as he immediately started on his usual speech about how amazing they will be, but Troy just stared at Gabriella. She tried to keep her eyes focused on Chad; however she stole a glance at him every now and then. He really was good looking. His skin was the perfect mix of tan and smoothness. His eyes shone in the dimly lit parlor. They looked at her with a softness that no one ever had. But she stopped herself from falling for them. She couldn't fall into his eyes.

But it was hard. Really hard.

"May I take your order?"

The waitress snapped Gabriella out of her trance. She sputtered out words that no one understood, but Troy just smirked.

"We'll have a large pepperoni with extra cheese, mushrooms and olives on half." He turned his attention back to Gabriella who had an awestruck look on his face.

"How did you know what I liked on my pizza?" she asked.

Troy shrugged. "In the hotel room you told me that your favorite pizza was pepperoni with extra cheese, mushrooms, and olives. But you never get to have it because your brothers hate mushrooms and they always out number you and order a carnivore."

Gabriella stared softly at him. "You remembered…"

"I remembered everything you told me."

She smiled. "Like what else?"

Troy's small smirk turned into a full smile when he saw her grin. "Well, you told me that the reason you don't play for the girl's team at school is because your mom needs the help at home." He told her. "And you told me that even though you complain about your brothers a lot, you don't know what you'd do with out them."

She slowly nodded her head. "They built me my-"

"glass house that you live in." He finished for her.

"Most brothers put their sisters in a plastic bubble, but mine put me in a glass house." She said with a soft smile. Troy reached his hand across the table and held hers. He rubbed his thumb across her knuckles softly. Gabriella blushed and tried to hold in her smile. "So what else do you remember about that night?"

"Well I remember you are one hell of a thumb wrestler." He said with a laugh. "And I remember that when you sleep you look like you're about five years old and you mumbled song lyrics."

Gabriella pulled her hand back. "I do not!"

Troy laughed harder. "You do to." He told her. "But it's cute." He watched her blush from across the table. He continues to smile. "And you do this thing with your hair when you're trying to explain something. You twist your finger around your hair like a million times," he twirled his finger around imaginary hair by his shoulder, "until you finally get out what you're trying to say."

She lightly tugged on her hair. "Why do you remember all of that?"

"Because it's important to me. Because you're important to me." his voice was soft and kind, as were his eyes. "And you really can be a bitch when you want to."

Her mouth dropped. "Ugh!" she screamed in a high voice. "What is that supposed to mean?"

He chuckled. "It means that you know what you want and you go for it, no matter who's in your way. And you always speak you mind, making you one of the most interesting girl's I've ever met."

Gabriella looked down at the empty table in front of her and twirled her hair around her finger, "So how do you think Tennessee is going to do this year?"

* * *

**Author's Note: Well, I'm back! Anyone else excited besides me? Thanks to everyone for waiting for me to get it all together.**

**And a special shout out to zanessaXtroyellagurl277, HSMandChelseaFCfan, sexyy, em91011, BeautifulxDreamer, kittykat0301, kyos-girl101, and dreamsescape. I really appreciated all of your suggestions, and I'm even using some of them. They were a great help in getting me back on track.**


	11. You’ve been in my closet?

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 11: You've been in my closet?**

Gabriella sat in Troy's car with her hands settled in her lap. Troy was next to her, with one land loosely steering and the other one resting on the gearshift, mere inches from her leg. She watched the scenery fly by as the radio flew softly out of the speakers.

"You haven't moved since we've gotten in the car." Troy finally broke the silence. "You're like a statue."

"I don't want to ruin anything. I mean this is the nicest car I've ever been in." she said quietly. "A 650i Coupe with all of the trimmings and I'm sure the engine is beyond amazing."

Troy glanced over her with a smirk on his face. "I never would have guessed that you knew anything about cars."

"You're forgetting who I live with." She said with a giggle. "My brothers and I go look at car's all the time. But then again, never cars this nice."

"But that doesn't mean you have to sit like you're frozen to the seat." Troy quickly made a sharp turn, making Gabriella grip her seat.

"My house is the other direction." She told him, looking behind her.

He nodded his head and made a few more sharp turn. "I know. But we still have a half an hour until your curfew." Troy pulled the car up to a deserted green field.

Gabriella looked around at the emptiness. "You planning on killing me?" she asked as she slowly unbuckled her seatbelt.

Troy laughed and quickly got out of the car. She watched him run around the front of the car and open her door. "Not quite." He held out his hand.

She smiled softly and accepted his hand. "You know I really shouldn't be walking on my foot."

"You're right." He quickly let go of her hand and spun around. "Hop on."

"What?" she said dumbfounded.

"You never heard of piggy back rides? Hop on." She sighed and set her hands on his shoulders. Pushing off on the ground, she jumped onto his back. "There you go." He tightened his grip on her legs.

"So where are we going?" Gabriella wrapped her arms around his neck as he started to walk across the field.

"You'll see." She said with a smile.

"Wake me when we get there." Gabriella sighed and rested her cheek against the side of his head. Her eyes closed at she fell into the rhythm of his steps and her arms loosed as they lightly drew designs on his chest. "This is nice." She decided.

The pace of his stride slowed down. "You aint seen nothing yet." he lightly moved his back to get her attention.

Slowly opening her eyes, her mouth fell. "Wha…where…?"

"Sentinel Field." He gently dropped her legs. "The best view of the city."

Gabriella walked out from behind Troy and stared at the scenery. They over looked downtown Albuquerque and all of the lights that lit up the city. "It's beautiful." She whispered.

"Yeah." Troy said softly. "Yeah, you are." She turned to face him and raised an eyebrow. "Okay, lame line." He blushed a little. "But did it work?"

Gabriella smiled a little. "I'll let you know." She took a seat on the grass and Troy sat down next to her. "So are you going to make one of your infamous moves now?"

Troy laughed. "Surprisingly no. I'd rather just sit here with you, if that's alright."

"Yeah." Gabriella blushed slightly. "That's alright." The two stared out at the view of the city in silence. Every once and a while she would steal a glance at Troy only to find out that he was looking back. Her emotions stirred inside of her.

"So was this a one night stand, or do I get to see you again?"

The question that had been haunting her all night. She looked over at Troy who was gazing over at her. Scooting as close to him as she could, she slightly opened her mouth. "You tell me." She leaned in close to him and lightly kissed his lips. She felt the spark of passions when they touched.

Troy wrapped his arms around her small body and lightly led her to the soft ground. Climbing on top of her, he stroked her hair behind her ear. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out.

Gabriella quickly closed the gap between their mouths. The second they connected she felt the passion between them grow. As Troy's strong hand grazed the side of her face she pulled at his shirt and ran her hands across his chest. She promptly lost herself on the kiss as Troy continued to make her realize what she's been missing all this time.

After what seemed like hours of blissful kissing, Troy finally laid on his back on the grass next to Gabriella. He scooped his arm under her neck and pulled her close to him. Her arm fell across his waist as her head rested on his chest. Slowly he ran his hand up and down her bare arm. "So was this one night worth it?" he asked with a husky breath.

A sigh left her mouth and her hand rubbed lightly up and down her chest. "I would say so."

"Good." He smiled. "Because I don't think I could hold up my end of the deal if you didn't have a good time. It would kill me to have to leave you alone."

Gabriella smiled. "Well you don't have to worry about that."

Troy grinned and hugged her closer to him. "Better get you home." He said. "Don't want your brothers to worry."

She groaned and nuzzled her face into his chest. "How late is it?"

"Ten minutes past your curfew."

Pushing herself off of Troy she said, "How long do you think it will take to get home?" He opened his mouth to answer, but she held up her hand. "Hold that thought."

She pressed her phone up against her ear. "Gabs where are you?" her brother yelled frantically into the phone.

"I'm on my way home right now." She told him. "Is everyone totally freaked out?" Gabriella followed Troy back to the car.

He sighed. "Not really, I kind of just got home. So their focus got shifted onto me."

"Kevin!" she exclaimed. "Scott and Trevor have to drive you on your dates, how could you have stayed out past curfew?"

"Angie kind of took a car from her house and we lost track of time." He told her. "And when I got home Mom sent everybody to bed, so it's just me in the living room."

"And where are Mom and Dad?"

Kevin sighed again, "In the kitchen deciding my punishment. If you get home fast I bet they won't even notice that you are gone."

She pressed the phone against her shoulder. "Troy, how fast can you get home?"

"How fast do you need?" he asked in return as he pulled onto the street.

Gabriella thought for a second, "Pretty dang fast."

Troy smirked and stepped on the gas. "Done."

She grinned and put the phone back up to her ear. "I'll be home soon. What do you think are my best chances?"

"Uh, I would say backyard kitchen door and sneak through up to the stairs." He told her. "They should be busy enough yelling at me to not notice you."

"Well, by getting caught sneaking in after curfew you're officially a Montez Man."

Kevin chuckled. "Yeah, that's what the other guys told me."

"I swear to God Kevin if you are on the phone...!" Gabriella heard her mom's voice ring through the phone.

"Got to go." He said quickly and hung up.

Gabriella giggled and looked at Troy. "I love it when you laugh." He said, turning sharply onto her street. "And your home."

"Thanks." She said softly. "This was a really fun night."

"You want me to walk you to your door?" he asked.

Gabriella snorted a laugh. "Seeing as I've already broken curfew and my own personal secret service is probably watching us right now, I think I better go it alone." She started to lean into Troy, but he stopped her.

"You just said that your brothers are probably watching."

She smirked. "Let them watch." She grabbed the back of Troy's head and pulled him in for a soft kiss. As she pulled away, she took his bottom lips between her teeth and gently bit him.

"You have no idea how much I love the idea of kissing you whenever I want." He breathed before kissing her again, and again, and again.

When they pulled away for the last time, Gabriella was pink. "I'll see you at school Troy." She pushed open the car door and quickly up to the backyard gate. With one last look at Troy, she pushed it open and quietly shut the gate. Walking through the cold grass, she slipped off her shoes and tip toed up the porch steps. Opening the slider the glow of light coming from the living room filled her eyes. As she reached the living room she slowly walked behind her parents, not making and sound, and reached the first stair. She was home free.

"Stop right there young lady."

&&&

"Come on Chad, say something." Gabriella pleaded. "It is so not that much of a shock."

Chad stood at her locker with a stunned look on his face. "Not that much of a shock? Gabs, you got grounded."

Gabriella slammed her locker door shut. "I know Chad, I was there."

"You getting in any kind of trouble is like the whole world rotating on its axis."

"I think you mean rotating off its axis." She pointed out.

"The point is that Gabriella Montez is the angel child who never gets in trouble, let alone grounded."

Gabriella looked at him. "Not that I total feel like crap for getting trouble, but it's just until Friday. What's the big deal?"

"You stayed out after curfew and only got four days?"

She shrugged. "Kevin's curfew is a half hour before mine and he came in right before me. So he got most of the wrath. Plus he and his girlfriend practically stole a car and neither of them even have their permits." She told him. "Compared to him I'm still the angel child."

"Your other brothers still think so?" Chad questioned.

"I left before any of them got up and sat in the library and studied for a few hours."

Chad sniggered. "Girl, you are in sooooo much trouble."

"The rest of the world may be afraid of my brothers, but there is no way that any of them will ever scare me."

"Hey Gabs."

Her breath caught in her throat. Gabriella spun around and saw her younger brother Kevin in front of her. A sigh of relief left her mouth.

Chad looked from brother to sister and then back again. "Looks like you two have some catching up to do. So I'm going to go catch up with the lovely Taylor." He quickly ran away from the two.

She eyed up her brother who looked as bad as she felt. "So we should probably talk about last night."

She followed her brother into an empty classroom. "I wanted to talk to you this morning, but Mom said you had gone to school early to study." Gabriella nodded her head slowly. "So are you going to tell me where you really where last night?"

"Are you going to tell me why you and your girlfriend stole a car?" she spat back, crossing her arms over her chest.

Kevin's mouth fell slightly. "We didn't steal it."

"You took it without the rightful owner knowing." She told him. "That's stealing. And you guys are both underage. Do you know how stupid that is?"

"Yes Gabriella I do." He said sternly. "And I heard Mom and Dad tell me all last night how stupid it was. And I'll be constantly reminded of how stupid it was when I'm sitting at home for a month with no phone, no video games, no computer, and no TV." He was now breathing deeply and staring down at his older sister. "So back to the first question; you going to tell me where you really were last night?"

"Kevin, I was with Chad and Taylor. You know that. You saw them pick me up." He said in a confident voice, not daring to loose eye contact.

"You still have Troy's sweatshirt hidden in your closet." Gabriella's eye grew soft. "Want to answer that again?"

She let a heavy sigh. "You've been in my closet?"

"God damn it Gabriella!"

"He's really not a bad guy. He's really sweet and kind and I know that he has a good heart." She tried to explain.

"God! Do you hear yourself? Until a week ago you thought that he was the biggest, most arrogant ass hole in the school."

"Kevin." She said strongly, but he wasn't ready to let her explain.

"And you were right! He is the guy that will take advantage of you the second you let him in. And you're going to end up sobbing on the couch with a big tub of ice cream again."

"Listen! It's different and I'm pretty sure that you damn well know that." Gabriella said fiercely. "And I don't get how you and Luke and Cole and everyone else thinks."

Kevin blinked. "What?"

"It's okay for you guys to only date girls for a week just to get a little action. But God forbid one of your own starts to feel something real and you all can't handle it because it's your sister that he fell for. And all of you do it, every single one of you. And Jason and Ian will do it too because they want to be just like their big brothers. You guys use girls because your social status let's you."

"Gabi, Troy is different."

"How the hell would any of you know?" she practically screamed at him. "All you guys see is party boy Troy. Even Chad hasn't seen the side of him that I have."

"Gabriella. Just listen to me."

She walked over to the closed door. "No. I'm done listening. And you're going to find a way to deal with it because he won't be intimidated by you. And neither will I. Just leave me along Kevin. Leave my life alone. And feel free to pass the message on to everyone else." She ripped open the door and let it slam behind her. Gabriella walked with heavy steps down the hallway, heading to a place she wasn't really sure of.

* * *

**Author's Note: 26 reviews and over 600 views? I call that a pretty successful comeback chapter for this story, don't you?**

**I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, because I absolutely _loved _writing it! And remember to leave a pretty review when you're done ;)**

**And, as most of you know, I have no problem with pimping out my other works of writing. So this is me asking all of you to (pretty please) check out my new story _Somewhere A Clock Is Ticking_. I adore the plot and everything that I have planned out for it, so I hope you guys will leave me enough encouragement to actually write it.**


	12. Like eating the last piece of pie

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 12: Like eating the last piece of pie **

Her corner was dark and secluded. The only sound that filled the air was the sound of soft sobs. Her cheeks were stained with the salty tears that had yet to stop. Sitting in a ball, her head between her knees, is how he found her.

"Gabriella?" Troy exclaimed. He dropped his book bag and ran down the hallway of books. Falling to his knees, he sat next to her. "Gabriella, what's wrong?"

She sniffled up her tears and slowly lifted her head off of her knees. "I blew up and I can't take it back."

"When did you blow up?" he asked softly.

"A few hours ago. Kevin, he confronted me and he couldn't handle it which set me off and…" her voice trailed off as new tears started to fall out of her deep eyes. "He's my little brother and I yelled at him. I questioned his character and his morals. I told him to leave me and my life alone. I'm a horrible sister."

Troy put him around Gabriella and pulled her in close to him. "You're not a horrible sister and I know you didn't mean any of the stuff you said."

"But that's the thing. I did mean it. I meant everything I said." She blubbered out.

"Wow, you really are a horrible sister." Gabriella let out a light cry and put her back between her knees. "Okay, bad time for a joke. Gabriella you're a great sister and sometimes sisters get mad at their brothers and say things that may not be the best stuff to say."

"It's not like I don't want to take it back! I meant to say it at the time, but I'm totally regretting all of it, from the second he came up to me in the hallway." She told him softly. "God, I really hate Chad sometimes." She looked back up at Troy.

"Did he start the fight?"

She shook her head and whipped away the tears on her face. "No he just left when Kevin got there. If he was there it wouldn't have happened."

Troy let a small, soft smile escape onto his lips. "You know it's not Chad's fault." Gabriella gently nodded her head. "What was the fight about?"

"Well, you." Troy's mouth fell, as he wanted to say something but nothing came out. "Well, it started out about you and you being a jerk, but a good hearted one. And then you and me and the possibility of a you and me. But then it morphed into this huge argument about how he and my other brothers are over protective and…and…and…" tears, once again, began to form and fall.

"Shh, it's okay. Don't worry. You don't have to tell me what happened." He said tenderly. Troy gently stroked the hair out of her face. "I'm sure he knows you were just blowing off steam."

"Oh really." She reached into her jean pocket and handed Troy her phone.

He flipped her open and looked at the black screen. "It's off."

"Turn it on." She sniffled.

He turned the phone on and the screen lit up with white messages. "Fifteen missed calls and twenty-four new texts." The phone started to vibrate in his hands. "Whoa, more texts and calls coming in."

She snatched the phone from him and turned it off. "All from my brothers who have cell phones." She peered over at Troy with curious eyes. "Why are you here?"

"Because you're sad and need a shoulder and some company. And I want you to know that I can always be that guy for you." He took her hand in his hand gently stroked him thumb over her knuckles.

She smiled. "That's really nice, but what I meant is why are you here? In the East High history and old yearbooks section of the library."

"Oh…" Troy slightly turned pink. "I uh, came in here for class and got lost…" Gabriella giggled, which in turn put a smile on his face. "Why are you here?"

"Well," she took a deep breath. "I don't have a car, so I can't really drive anywhere. My foot still hurts a lot, so it probably wouldn't be good to walk too far on it. And I thought it would be a really bad idea to ride the bus somewhere when I'm in a pretty bad mood."

Troy nodded. "Yeah, that would probably be a bad idea."

"And it's just my natural nerd instinct to come to a library when I don't when I don't know where to go."

"You're not a nerd…"

"You've called me a nerd!" Her eyes started to swell. "And my brothers call me their little nerd."

Troy pushed himself off of the ground. "Okay, we are getting you out of here." He grabbed her hands and pulled her onto her feet. "You can't just sit here and mope all day."

Gabriella watched Troy gather up her books as well as his own bag. "Why not?"

"Because," he grabbed her hand and led her down the hall. "No matter how smart you are, moping is bad for you. And you could find all the evidence in the world, but it still won't be able to prove that moping around and feeling sorry for yourself is good."

"But-"

Troy cut her off. "No, Gabriella. You just have to trust me."

She whipped a hand across her face. "Yeah, that's fine. But the exit is this way." She pointed in the opposite direction.

"Oh... Yeah, right…." He spun around and pulled her out the exit.

"Troy we can't leave school." She complained. "You have practice."

"It won't kill me to miss a day. Plus it's not like I don't practice at home. Coach has got me running drills for three more hours." He told her.

"…Coach?" she asked softly.

Troy let out a heavy sigh. "He doesn't know I exist if it doesn't have to do with basketball. I could be doing hard drugs and be a stripper and he wouldn't notice just as long as I showed up on time for practice." He watched her eyes widen. "Oh, I'm not doing any of that stuff." He saw her lightly exhale a breath. "He hasn't been a dad to me in years. So he's just coach."

"And your mom?"

"She's too busy at work or buying stuff to notice half the time. I swear if we didn't leave at the same time in the morning she wouldn't know she had a son."

"And Angela?"

Troy smiled. "Angie's the only family I've ever had. She used to live on the other side of town and go to West High, but when her parents decided to move to Africa to take care of sick kids she moved in with us. She's the only reason I haven't moved out yet." He finally reached the library exit and let go of Gabriella's hand. "But this isn't about me. It's about you."

Her eyes swelled with tears. "I'm the worst sister in the world."

She started to slide down the door, but Troy pulled her up. "Oh, no. We're not doing this anymore remember?" They started to walk slowly out to his car. "Where do you want to go?"

He opened her door and she slid into the passenger seat. "Oh I don't know. I've only skipped school once." Her bottom lip started to quiver. "Cole and Luke called me out of English last year. They said it was because of an emergency, but they just wanted me to have some fun." She took a deep breath. "They took me to the county fair in Las Vegas."

"They took you all the way to Nevada? In a school day?"

She shook her head. "Las Vegas, New Mexico. It's about two hours north east of here."

He slid his hand onto her knee and rubbed it gently. "It's all right. Siblings fight. Especially brothers and sisters."

"Not us." She said sternly. "I mean, I yell at them for stupid stuff. Like eating the last piece of pie. Or messing with my room or listening in on my phone calls, but we've never fought. It's always been one sided."

"So all that stuff about them getting in your personal life…?"

She sniffed in the tears. "Sure, it bugs me and it's a little unfair that I can't really have a relationship because of their over protectiveness. But I don't hate it as much as I put on. They're my brothers and that's what their supposed to do."

"So you still want them to let up on you?"

"No." Gabriella shook her head. "I want a guy who won't care about them and their threats. A guy who knows that what we could have is worth the three weeks of crap." She looked over at Troy and smiled. "And I think I found him."

Troy took her hand in his. "I think you did too." He brought her hand up to her lips and gently kissed her knuckles.

A tingling sensation flew up and her arm and drew a smile to her lips. She blushed and laced her fingers in with the boy sitting next to her.

&&&

Troy looked over at the sleeping girl next to him. A smile spread across his face as he remembered back to the last time he saw her sleep. They were lying in bed together and her eyes had drifted shut near the middle of the movie. He had observed how graceful and childlike she looked, and before he knew it, he too had fallen into a deep asleep.

His ring tone sounded, snapping him out of his trance. He took another sweet look at her as he reached for his phone.

"Hello?" he said in a husky voice, trying not to wake Gabriella.

"Troy!" Chad exclaimed into the phone. "Where the hell are you?"

"Obviously you can tell I'm not in school." He said with a small smirk.

"Obviously." He repeated bitterly. "Coach flipped out when you didn't show up for the free period work out."

"Yeah, well…" Troy sighed. "That's couch for you."

He heard his friend sigh on the other end of the two phones. "He's seriously considering not playing you during the state games if you miss another practice."

"Let him. See what I care. Besides, some of the seniors need more playing time to get a scholarship. I'm only a junior, I have plenty of time to impress the scouts."

"Look, just show up for the rest of the practices, okay? I don't want my best friend to be benched right before state just because he skipped school."

Troy sighed. "Okay. I'll be there. Is that the only reason you called?"

"Actually, no." Chad said. "Your absence at practice sparked another freak out."

He groaned. "Oh great…"

"Gabriella never showed for first period. Luke says all of them have been trying to reach her all day and she's not answering. Apparently she and Kevin had a fight or something before school." Chad told his friend. "I'm kind of worried about her. Me and Taylor have tried calling her a couple of times too, but she's not answering us either."

"That's because her phone is off." Troy informed him. "There's probably a hundred missed calls by now…" he muttered.

"Troy, you know where she is?"

"You could say that."

"Troy!" he screamed into the phone.

"Chad, chill out." He said in a hushed voice looking back over at Gabriella. "She's sleeping right next to me and I don't want to wake her."

A moment of silence hung between them. "You didn't."

"So what if I did?" he asked. "What's the big deal?"

"Troy!" Chad groaned. "I…just let me know where she is so Taylor can stop freaking out."

"I can't really tell you." Troy muttered.

"Why not?" A sharp rumbled came form the other end of the phone.

"Troy!" a voice yelled at him.

"Taylor?" he questioned the voice.

"Of course it's Taylor! Who else do you think it would be, the Easter bunny?" she asked redundantly. "Where is Gabriella?"

"She's right next to me."

"Troy!" she yelled again.

"Look Taylor, she's alright. In fact she's great and I'm just trying to let her get some sleep. When she wakes up I'll have her give you a call.

"But-"

Troy hung up the phone and turned it off as it started to ring again. He looked over at Gabriella and smiled softly. "Even when you're asleep you can still put a smile on my face."

* * *

**Author's Note: Snow days rock. I get so much done.**

**I hope everyone liked the chapter!**


	13. It's all my fault

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 13: It's all my fault**

Gabriella's eyes fluttered open as the sun beamed down on her. Sitting up, she tired to stretch but found herself limited by the car. "How long was I asleep?" she asked as she looked around at the slowly passing scenery.

"Only about an hour." He told her. "But I did get a frantic call from Chad and Taylor."

She buried her face into her hands. "As if I don't have enough to worry about."

"Well, you might have one more thing to worry about."

She snorted a laugh. "The only thing that could be worse is if they thought I slept with you." Gabriella giggled and expected Troy to join in. "Troy…?"

"I thought it would be a good joke." He defended himself. "And I didn't actually say we had sex. I just said that you were sleeping next to me and I thought you needed a rest."

"Oh my God." She started breathing heavily.

"I thought it would lighten the mood."

"Taylor is probably freaking out right now!"

"You _were_ sleeping and I _did_ think that you needed rest after that talk with you brother."

Her eyes widened. "My brothers." She said in a small breath. "What if my brothers heard about this? They could think I'm sleeping with you just to get back at them."

"Suddenly, I feel kind of used." Troy held a hand to his heart. Gabriella whipped her head around and glared at him. "Okay, so it was a bad idea."

"You think?" she spat bitterly. Her face fell back into her hands. "This day could seriously not get any worse."

"Uhh, well…" Troy stammered. "I think that's your mom right there."

Gabriella's head snapped up, as she saw her mom walking across the street. "Turn left!" she screamed. Troy obediently took a hard left into an alley. "She must be on her lunch break." Gabriella peered over her seat and out the back window.

"Oh, lunch sounds good…" he muttered as he pulled back out onto the road. "Where do you want to eat? I think Rococo's sounds good, don't you?"

"I'm having the worst day of my life and all you can think about is food?"

Troy pulled into a parking space outside of the restaurant and turned too the car. "Food isn't all I'm thinking about." He gently put him hand on her silky dark hair. His lips found their place on her's as he gently kissed her. "It's just the only thing that has a chance of keeping me under control." He got out of the car and ran over to her door. Opening it, he noticed the shocked look on her face. "Was that a bad thing to do?" he asked nervously.

A small smile crept onto her face. "No, it was just the thing I needed."

Troy grinned and took a hold of her hand. They walked up to the restaurant together, both smiling.

Gabriella sat at the table, her face buried in the menu. She could feel Troy's eyes peering at her over the top of his menu, but she ignored his eyes and blushed.

"I'm Scott and I'll be your waiter today," Gabriella's eyes grew large and she shoved her face deeper into the menu. They were at Rococo's. Scott worked at Rococo's. "Would you like to try…oh hey Troy…" She knew he was looking at Troy, glaring at was probably more like it. "Gabriella!" He ripped the menu out of her hands. "Why the hell aren't you in school?" she opened her mouth, but nothing came out. "And why are you on a date?"

"It's not a date." She said quickly.

Troy's head snapped to the girl across from him. "It's not?" She tried to signal him to shut up, but he didn't catch the hint. "I thought we were actually getting somewhere, but the second one of your brother comes into the picture it's all out the window? What happened to this morning?"

"Yeah." Scott crossed his arms across his chest. "What happening this morning."

"What happened to standing up to your brothers?"

"What happened to family knows best?"

"I though we had a connection, Gabriella."

"I thought you knew it was idiotic to skip school."

"I'm sorry that I kind of led on to Chad that we slept together-"

"You slept with him!" Scott interrupted with a screech. "Gabriella Anna Montez, we need to have a serious talk.

"Stop!" Gabriella yelled. "Just stop! Troy, I do like you, I'm not mad at you, I was trying to give you a hint to shut up, but you didn't get it." She told him sharply.

"Oh…" Troy leaned back into the cushion. "Scott, you can just forget everything I said."

"Not likely." He pushed Troy farther into the booth and took a seat next to him. "You," Scott pointed at Gabriella. "Start explaining, and I mean now."

"First of all, you're not dad. You have no authority over me and I don't have to do anything you say." She took a deep breath. "But if I leave it at that again, I'm going to be an ever more horrible sister than I already am." Scott leaned back and crossed his arms, ready to listen. "You all know how much I don't like it when you guys interfere with my personal life, or lack there of. So when Kevin confronted me this morning about being with Troy, I kind of blew up. And I'm sorry about it and I'm sorry about leaving school. But I need you guys to take a step back. I can choose for myself."

"You've proven that you can't." Scott said sternly. "Do you need me to refresh your memory?"

"No. But I've grown and you know that. I'm not going to make that mistake again."

Scott let out a heavy sigh and turned to face Troy. "You going to hurt her?"

"I..I…I don't plan on it." His brow scrunched up and his eyes narrowed. "I mean, I won't. I won't hurt her."

"You better hope so." He turned back to Gabriella. "Now get."

Gabriella jumped out of the booth as fast as she could and ran outside to Troy's car. He joined her there a minute later.

"I am so sorry that I didn't catch that hint." He wrapped his arms around her small body. "You know that I wouldn't purposely do anything to make things worse, don't you?"

"I know." She mumbled into his chest. "But next time I give you a hint like that, please just shut up."

He laughed into her hair. "Promise." He placed a gentle kiss on the side of her head as the pulled apart. "Would now be a bad time to give you a present?"

Gabriella's mouth fell a little, "Uh, well, kind of. But you've had pretty terrible timing for everything else today, so I guess it'd be the right time considering the circumstances."

Troy grinned brightly. "Good." He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small black velvet box. As he opened it, a silver necklace with a simple heart pendant on the end shone in the sun. "For you."

"I, I can't. I mean, I like it, but it's just so soon." She stammered out.

He took the necklace out of the box and placed it around her neck. "I don't care. I want you to know that I'm really not going anywhere. And it looks great on you." He said as he finished clipping it.

She peered down at the necklace, "Thank you." She said in a small voice. "It's beautiful." She sat down in his car and looked at her necklace in the mirror. "You know it looks a lot like the necklace that Trevor's girlfriends used to wear."

"Uh, yeah." Troy said as he pulled out of the parking lot. "It's been passed down through the captains of the basketball team for years. It's kind of tradition to give it to the girl of your dreams."

She smiled softly. "That's sweet." He grabbed Gabriella's hand and rubbed it softly as he started up the car. Slowly, her face started to scrunch up and he breathing became shorter. "I'm such a terrible sister…" she muttered.

"Oh, no. Come on Gabriella. We talked about this." He tried to calm her down. "You're not a terrible sister."

She shook her head. "No. I really am. I mean what sister yells at her little brother and then mouths off at her older brother all because of a stupid guy." She grumbled. "No offense." She added once it became apparent to her that the 'stupid guy' was sitting next to her.

Troy sighed, "Gabriella. You are _not_ a terrible sister. Okay?"

"You don't get it Troy." She told him sternly. "I am the one in the family who keeps it all together and is level headed and always does what she is told. And lately I've been throwing the family out of order. Getting grounded, not listening to my brother's advice, skipping school…it's just not me. I'm terrible because I'm the one who is changing the order of things when they were working perfectly fine before."

Tory sighed. "I'm going to be honest. I really have no clue about what you're talking about."

She smiled lightly. "That's okay. I don't even get what I said. It's just…it's all my fault. All the change. It's my fault and I need to fix it."

**&&&**

Gabriella paced outside of the boy's locker room. Her steps grew smaller as the wait grew longer. She tried to keep her breath steady but the worry that filled her made it hard. Mentally, she was ready. She was ready to face her brothers after the most perfect, terrible day she had ever experienced.

A heavy sigh sounded behind her. She spun around and saw her brother standing behind her. One single tear rolled down her cheek as he slowly walked towards her.

She walked straight into her brother's arms. Her arms wrapped around him tightly as his circled her shoulders. "I'm so sorry Kevin." She said quietly.

"It's okay Gabs." He whispered. "You had every right to get mad."

She closed her eyes as she squeezed him tighter. "I just couldn't take it anymore."

He set his hands on her shoulders and slowly pushed her away, "Hey." Kevin looked down at his sister. "What happened to my kick ass big sister who doesn't take shit from anyone?"

Gabriella giggled. "She's still here. She just…she just let her emotions get the best of her."

"Well don't do that anymore." He lightly shook her. "I wasn't there the last time you cried, so I wasn't prepared for it this time. And I don't want to see you cry again."

"I don't plan on it." She looked up at her little brother and smiled curiously. "How can you be here? You're grounded…"

"Oh, well uh, Scott told me what happened at work when he got home and I made him drive me to the school. I kind of figured you wanted to talk to Troy again."

Gabriella smiled. "Actually I was waiting to talk to Chad. And try to avoid Luke for as long as possible."

"Looks like that's a wish that isn't coming true."

Gabriella spun around and saw Luke standing in front of her. "Luke, I know that you're mad, but please don't be mad at Troy. It's not his fault."

He glared down at her and she continued staring back. His eyes were dark and unreadable. He was her most temperamental and irritable brother. "I'll see you at home Gabriella." Luke said in a husky voice. He walked past his slightly stunned little sister. "Come on Kevin. Scott's waiting in the car."

Kevin gave Gabriella a small nudge before fallowing his brother out the door.

The rest of the basketball player filed out of the locker room all giving Gabriella a wink and a smirk. Two of the last were Troy and Chad. "Didn't think I'd see you." Troy said as he walked up to her. "Not that I'm complaining."

"Actually I wanted to talk to Chad."

Troy nodded and kept on walking, touching her arm lightly as he passed.

"Start talking." Chad said simply.

Gabriella started a slow walk down the hallway with Chad at her side. "You know I didn't sleep with Troy."

He shrugged and threw his bag over his shoulder. "I really don't know what to think, Gabs. The last time you started acting out of character, it was terrible."

"Why is everyone bringing that up?" she muttered under her breath.

"Because even though you can't see it, this situation with Troy is a lot like two years ago."

"But I didn't sleep with him! And he had nothing to do with me skipping school."

"He had everything to do with it!" Chad exclaimed. "If you hadn't given into him, you wouldn't have fought with Kevin and you wouldn't have skipped school. With Troy."

"You set me up on the date with him!"

"I thought you were smart enough to take it slower, especially with a guy like him."

Gabriella sighed. "I've been having this conversation with you and my brothers every since _you_ introduced me to him. And I'm done." She sped up her walk, leaving Chad in the empty hall behind her.

* * *

**AN: Sorry for the month wait, there's been a lot of stuff going on in my life that I can't control so that took away from my writing time. But I hope you enjoyed this chapter, all the drama**. 


	14. Now behave yourself

**Life In A Glass House**

**Chapter 14: Now behave yourself**

Gabriella fingered her necklace as she sat on the bus. Troy's arm encircled her shoulder and her head rested on his shoulder. His head had lazily fallen on top of her own and his hand that hand been softly rubbing her leg had fallen onto the seat. She gently pushed the necklace back under her sweatshirt.

"Something's wrong." He said. "I know you. Something's wrong."

She shook her head, making his move off of her. "You don't know me Troy. And that's the problem."

"What do you mean I don't know you?" he asked curiously.

She shrugged her shoulders, but didn't move from his grasp. "You've only known me for a few weeks. You don't know me as well as Taylor, or Chad, or even my brothers." She sighed. "And I want you to, but you don't."

"Hey, I want to know everything about you. But that stuff just takes time."

"It just makes me think if this connection between us only goes as far as really hot kisses and sarcastic conversations."

"We've had serious conversations." He said lightly.

She sighed again, "But only when I'm upset…"

"Which bring me back to my original question." He said. "What's wrong?"

Gabriella shook her head and sat up from Troy's grasp. "I haven't seen Scott or Trevor for days, Cole hasn't smiled anywhere near my direction, Luke won't even look at me, Ian and Jason just follow what the older guys do so they are ignoring me," she to a deep breath, "Chad hasn't said a word to me since we had that talk in the hallways, Taylor won't say anything more then necessary to me And Kevin… Kevin is the only one talking to me because he feels bad for me."

She shook her head and looked down at her hands. "My only friends are you and Sarah. And even Sarah is a little unpredictable on how she'll act towards me."

"Who's Sarah?"

"My dog…"

Troy chuckled. "I hope I hold a better conversation than your dog."

"Most of the time." She winked at him with a smirk on her face.

Troy grinned. "They'll come around. I'm sure they will."

"I hope you're right. I've never not been on speaking terms with any of them let alone all of them at once." Gabriella let out a heavy sigh. "This is going to be some trip."

"Just focus on the hottie ruling the court and I think you'll be fine."

She pushed off of his and slapped him in the chest. "God, you are so arrogant."

Troy learned close to her and put his pace by her ear. "But that's why you like me."

Gabriella grinned and shoved him away from her. "I think while we're on the bus that it would be best if you stay on you're side of the seat and if I stay on my side."

Troy set his hands to his side, respecting Gabriella's request. He watched her stare out the window. Her long dark hair flowed down her back and gently blew from the open window. His hand inched from his side, slowly closing the distance between itself and her left.

"Troy!" she exclaimed. Gabriella felt his hand settle onto her knee.

His hands flew up, proclaiming his guilt. "Sorry. Couldn't help myself."

"Yeah, I bet." Her eyes rolled. "Now stay over there."

"But, why?" he complained.

"Because," she explained, "three out of the fifteen people on this bus are mad at me right now and you are one of the reasons. Now behave yourself. We're almost there."

He leaned in close to her and whispered in her ear. "You owe me." he said with his signature smirk.

Gabriella placed her hand in the middle of his face and pushed him away. "I owe you nothing."

Coach Bolton stood up at the front of the bus. "Men!" he bellowed. His eyes fell to Taylor who was glaring at him. "And Taylor and Gabriella." He quickly added. "Before we get to the hotel I want to tell you all that this is probably the most important two weeks of your life. If we win the first six games we play, which I expect us to, we are on the fast track to the state championship."

"What does that mean?" Jason asked from the back of the bus.

"It means that we won't have to play another game until the championship game." The coach explained. "Taylor will hand out the room assignments and keys. Ten o'clock every night and if I catch any of you frolicking with a member of the opposite sex, there will be hell to pay." The whole bus stared at him. "With that said, get some rest. We have our first game tomorrow at four."

Coach Bolton sat back down and Taylor stood up with a handful of envelopes. She walked down the small aisle giving each player their own envelope. When she reached Gabriella she crouched down to their level. "You guys are rooming together. No need to thank me because I'm sure you guys would have found a way to enjoy a roll in the hay." She dropped the envelopes into their laps and continued on.

Troy's jaw fell along with Gabriella's. "Damn, Taylor's got some guts…" he muttered.

Gabriella crawled over Troy and jumped out of the seat and cornered her at the back of the bus. "What is you're problem?" she snapped at her 'friend'.

"You skipped school and slept with Troy. Sounds like you're the one with the problem." She snapped back.

"I never slept with him and I really don't plan on it." Gabriella said clearly. "And you were so gung ho for me and Troy to get together. What's with the sudden change of attitude?"

"I just heard some stuff that wasn't the kind of stuff you want to hear about your best friend."

"Well whatever it is, it's not true."

"And then your fight with Chad. He kind of influenced me to not talk to you for a while."

"Well screw him." Gabriella joked. "Oh, but not literally." She added quickly.

Taylor cracked a smile. "Just make sure you patch things up with him soon."

"Trust me, I really want to, but it's kind of hard when he won't even talk to me."

"And there's nothing sexual between you and Troy?"

Gabriella smirked. "Well there's plenty of sexual stuff, just no follow through."

Taylor grinned. "Well in that case I think you guys are absolutely adorable together." She exclaimed with a grin. "Oh, and I'm really sorry about the whole roll in the hay comment."

Gabriella giggled and hugged her friend before going back to her own seat. "Things all patched up with Taylor?" he looked up at her as she stood beside him.

She grinned, "Yep. Things are all good and she's back to rooting for us as a couple. Now move over so I can sit."

Troy shook his head. "Nah." He decided.

"What do you mean, 'Nah'?" she asked. "I don't want to crawl over you again."

A smirk remained on his face. "I kind of liked the view when you climbed over me."

Gabriella's jaw dropped and she smacked him on the back of the head. "Pig!"

Troy opened his mouth to retaliate but his father cut him off. "Miss Montez, would you please sit down." He yelled from the front of the bus.

She turned her head to yell back to find that he had already turned his attention back to his clips board. All of a sudden she felt a pair of strong hands of her hips pulling her downward. The next thing she knew she was looking his straight in the eye, situated on his lap.

"Coach's orders." Troy smirked at her. His fingers laced into each other and settled upon her hip.

"Since when do you listen to the coach?" she asked, her arm settled around his neck while the other one settled softly on his chest.

"Since when what he says is helpful to my current situation."

Her eyebrows rose. "What current situation could you possibly be in?" she asked. "You're going to the state championship games and you have me on your lap and not slapping you for it. Sounds like you got it pretty good to me."

Troy sighed. "But you are trying to resist me and that's really not working out for me."

"Oh really?"

"Yeah," he continued. "I figured that if you were this close to me then you'd have no chance of resisting me." he slowly closed his eyes and kissed her jaw line.

Gabriella tried not to faint, but it was proving to be a difficult task. "You know what would make you incredibly sexy to me."

Troy smirked and squeezed her hip. "What would that be?"

She leaned in close and placed her mouth as close to his ear as it could be. "Having a better free throw percentage." She whispered.

"Get a room, you two!" Zeke bellowed as he walked past them.

"Please, don't." Luke muttered, brushing past them.

Gabriella watched her brother was down the rest of the bus with a heavy sigh escaping her mouth.

"You should talk to him." He told her. Troy pushed her off of his lap and handed Gabriella her bag.

She swung the East High colored bag over her shoulder and weakly smiled at Troy. As she turned around, Gabriella felt a light pat on her butt. She turned around and looked at Troy with wide eyes.

His hands shot up again. "For good luck." He grinned.

Her eyes rolled and she ran off the bus before he could wish her luck again. Once off the bus, her eyes darted around for her brother.

"Kevin?" she asked in amazement, running towards him "You weren't on the bus…were you?"

"No, Coach Bolton wanted the freshman team to see the varsity play, so here I am." He shrugged. "Nice sweatshirt Gabriella."

She sighed looking down at her black East High basketball sweatshirt that had Bolton written on the back of it. "Kevin. He's my boyfriend now and there's nothing you or anyone else can do about it."

"Glad to know you're not letting just anyone grab your ass." He snipped as he brushed past her to join the rest of his team.

"Have you seen Luke?" she called after him.

He spun around and looked at her. "He already when up to his room. Said something about not wanting to watch you and Troy swap anymore spit."

Her mouth slightly dropped. "I knew my brother's could be rude, but this is ridiculous." She muttered under her breath. Gabriella crossed her arms and drug herself into the hotel.

The ceilings were high, the floor was shiny, and the air smelled like flowers. "Coach Bolton sure stepped it up." She muttered as she stared at the crystal chandelier above her. "I wonder if they know that their currently the housing for twelve horny East High basketballers?"

"How dare you lump me in the same category as those other guys." Troy swung his arm over Gabriella's shoulders. "I, for one, am more than just a horny teenager."

Gabriella stared at him. "Just make sure that whatever you are, you keep it to yourself."

He held his other hand to his heart. "You continually hurt me, Gabriella. I don't know how much more my heart can take.

She giggled and walked herself and Troy into the elevator. "What floor Mr. Broken Heart?"

"Uh, 10?"

Gabriella pushed the button and watched it light up. "You've talked to Luke more in the past few days than I have, is he really mad at me?"

Troy shrugged. His arms moved off of her shoulders and his hands shoved into his pockets, "He's more mad at the situation than at you personally. You're his little sister and he wants to protect you from the big bad Troy."

She cracked a smile. "The more time I spend with you, you become farther and farther away from being 'the big bad Troy.'"

The elevator doors opened and the two made their way down the hall until they found their room. Troy slid the room key and unlocked the door.

"So what do you want to do?" she asked as she threw her bag on the bed and pulled out a few items and set them on her bag. "Everyone is probably going to be at the pool, so we could go hang out there or go get something to eat or go explore the town…"

She turned around and was immediately met by Troy's mouth. His soft lips had taken her by surprise. He promptly wrapped his arms tightly around her waist, forcing them to be as close together as possible. Slowly, she moved to her hands up to his neck and gently massaged his hair line.

Goosebumps covered each of their bodies as Troy's tongue slid between her lips and entered her wanting mouth. She stoked her tongue along his making them both smile.

"What was that for?" Gabriella asked as their mouths parted. Their bodies stayed together.

Troy kissed her gently and quickly. "Well, our PE homework was to make sure that your comfortable being close to your partner because we're doing the argentine tango when we get back." He kissed her once again. "And I wanted to make sure that we are as comfortable as possible."

Gabriella nodded her head. "I think we need to practice some more."

Troy grinned and pressed his mouth against her. In return Gabriella bit his bottom lip His arms loosened their grip and her body and she took the opportunity to move her hands down his body and under his sweatshirt. He lifted his arms up and she swiftly pulled it over his head.

His hands ran down the side of body until they reached the spot where her sweatshirt and jeans met. He gripped the cloth and quickly pulled it off. His hand rested on her chest with the necklace under it. "I love seeing you wear this." He said in a rough voice.

Gabriella giggled and rested her hands on his shoulders. "You are some guy Troy Bolton."

Troy smiled lightly as he stared into her deep eyes. "And you are some girl." He tipped them backwards onto the bed while they started to kiss again. His hand stroked the side of her hair Gabriella ran her hands up and down his muscular arms. Troy's other hand worked its way under her shirts and settled upon her soft skin.

"Hey Gabi, I have your room key…"

Troy and Gabriella jumped apart. "Taylor." She said in a panicked voice.

"Looks like I'm interrupting something. So, I'll leave it here and you can just give me mine later." She dashed out of the door and let it slam behind her.

Gabriella turned a deep shade of red and looked over at Troy. "Oh my gosh!" she covered her eyes with her hands. "That was so embossing!"

Troy smirked and crawled back over to her. "But it was fun." He leaved down to kiss her again, but Gabriella rolled off of the bed and onto her feet.

"Let's go swimming, at the pool, where there are a lot of people." She said quickly. Her hand dove into her ban and pulled out a swimsuit. She ran into the bathroom and locked the door behind her.

Troy laughed and put his arms behind his head. "This is going to be some trip."

* * *

**Author's Note: Woot, another chapter!! I hope every one likes it.**

**And I realize that this story has become kind of heavy which isn't what I intended. So in the next few chapters I'm going to try to get the light heartedness and humor back into it at full speed.**


	15. We’re like a broken freezer

**Life In A Glass House**

**Chapter 15: We're like a broken freezer**

Taylor and Gabriella stood in the empty gym after the game. "That's one win," Taylor threw her clipboard onto her chair. "Only a half a dozen more to go."

"Tay, you know what you saw yesterday was completely innocent." Gabriella said.

"Yeah, I know. And have I told you how sorry I am? I thought the worst when I know you wouldn't do something like that."

Gabriella gave her a weak smile. "Yeah…" her voice was drowned out by the sound of dribbling basketballs and yelling boys. "They changed a lot faster than normal."

"They're excited." Taylor said with a smirk. "And when they're excited, they're happy and when they're happy…"

"Hey baby!" Chad ran up to Taylor and gave her a giant hug. "That was a great game!" he ended his hug with a gentle kiss.

"Hey Montez." Troy wrapped Gabriella in a hug from behind. "You like watching me play?"

She giggled and spun around. "I liked watching us win." She told him. "But your 17 points were impressive."

Troy grinned. He picked her up in a hug and spun her around. "It's all because of my good luck charm."

"You've had plenty of luck this season without me."

"Without you it's skill, with you it's luck."

Gabriella looked up at him. "That made absolutely no sense."

Troy shrugged, but kept her in his arms. "I don't need to make sense." he quickly leaned into her for a kiss. "You're the smart one in the relationship."

"But you're the cute one."

"No you're the cute one."

Chad shoved a ball between the couple. "You guys sicken me."

"Seriously." Taylor added. "Don't get me wrong. I'm all for the honeymoon phase of a relationship, but get over it."

"Sorry." Gabriella blushed as she left Troy. "It's all just happened really fast, and I don't want to miss the fun part of us. It seems like just yesterday we were fighting and Troy was trying to pursue me while I was ignoring him."

"That was just yesterday. You guys totally got in a fight at the pool."

Gabriella rolled her eyes. "Let's just go play some basketball."

Taylor giggled and walked with Gabriella over to the boys. "Haven't you guys had enough basketball?"

"Baby, when are you going to learn that when it comes to basketball, there isn't such thing as too much." Chad said as he watched his shot glide into the hoop.

Gabriella held her hands out for the ball and Troy passed it too her. "As much as I hate agreeing with the bonehead, I do have to agree." She shot the ball and watched it go into the hoop. "The game rocks."

"That's some shot you have there."

Gabriella spun around to see a tall boy dressed in a green and black track suit walking towards her. "I know." She said stiffly.

"Aren't we a little high on our self?" he stood right in front of her.

Gabriella crossed her arms and looked up at him. "No, I just know I have a good shot and I don't see a reason in pretending it was an accident."

He smirked and nodded his head. "David." He held his hand out.

She ignored his hand and kept her arms crossed. "I know." She said shortly.

"So are you doing anything tonight?"

Gabriella snorted a laugh. "You think I'll go out with you?"

"That's the general idea."

"Well in that case, I'm busy. Tootles." she turned around and started to walk away when he grabbed her arm. "If you value your shooting arm, I suggest you let go."

"Make me." he challenged as a fire brewed in his eyes.

Gabriella was ready flip him over onto the hard wood floor when Troy appeared at her side. "I suggest you let go." He repeated.

He immediately let go. "Bolton. Haven't seen you since last year's championship game. You know, the game we won."

"You wont be winning this year." His eyes glared at the other boy. "And if you ever touch my girlfriend again you won't be walking either."

He held his hands up and slowly walked away, "Whatever you say, Bolton."

As soon as she saw him leave the gym Gabriella swiftly turned around and walked away, hitting Troy in the face with her hair in the process.

"Gabriella, what's wrong?" Troy ran after her.

"I don't need my boyfriend defending my honor. I had the situation perfectly under control." She said stiffly.

"Look, I'm not going to stand by and let some jack ass try to take advantage of you."

"A jack ass trying to take advantage of me? Sounds a lot like you."

Troy let out a heavy sigh. "Gabriella you know that was never my intention."

"It doesn't matter!" she stopped and turned to face him. "Every day of my life I have a boy defending me and fighting my battles and I can't stand it. And you know that. You know that I can handle situations on my own, but you still found the need to butt in." She didn't wait for Troy's answer. Gabriella once again, hit Troy in the face with her hair as she walked away.

**HSMHSMHSM**

Troy pounded on the door. "Let me in!" he yelled, his first still hammering. "You can't keep me locked out all night!"

The door ripped open and Gabriella's eyes narrowed at him. "Just watch me." she slammed the door before he had a chance to retaliate or move.

"Gabriella!" he started beating on the door again. "Come on! Open the door!"

"In case you mssed the last ten seconds, I already did that."She sat through the door.

Troy sighed, slammeding his fist as hard as he could. "Let me in Gabriella!"

Luke emerged from his room. "Bolton! Shut up! You're going to wake up the whole damn floor."

"Do you have a better way of getting me into my room?" he asked.

Luke smirked. "It was only a matter of before my sister saw what kind of guy you are."

Troy glared at his teammate. "That's not why she locked me out." Luke raised his eyebrows in interest. "That kid David from Jefferson High was hitting on Gabriella and I got in the middle of it and she got pissed." Luke's eyebrows raised. "And now I'm locked out of the room." He finished. "Open the damn door Gabriella!"

Luke chuckled as Troy pounded harder on the door. "That won't do anything. If she's decided that she doesn't want to open the door, then she won't open the door. She goes with her gut and right now I'll bet you anything her gut is telling her that you thing of her as a little girl that needs to be protected."

"But that's not what I think of her."

"Doesn't matter." Luke told his teammate. "She's got tough skin, and an even tougher heart."

Troy's fist fell and he looked over his shoulder. "Then what do you suggest I do."

"Just get another key from the front desk." Luke said simply. "You know there are things called night managers."

He let out a heavy sigh. "You coming?" his feet started a slow trudge towards down the hall with Luke right beside him.

"I thought that you hanging out with my sister would give you a little more intelligence."

Troy cracked a smile and shoved his hands into his pockets. "She really misses you, you know? She talks about it all the time."

Luke immediately shook his head. "She doesn't miss me. She only thinks of us as life ruiners and guys who just get in the way of her living."

"No." Troy said sternly. "She may act like it, but you should know as well as anyone that there is a lot more to Gabriella than what is just on the surface. She really needs her brothers, all of them."

Luke's face stayed cold and hard. "Never thought I'd say this, but you're a decent guy Troy."

"Thanks." He said with a smile. "Glad someone thinks so."

"Look, don't take what the guys and Chad say personally. We're all just looking out for Gabriella."

"I get it, I do. I mean I look out for Angie as much as I can. But you guys make it really hard for a guy."

Luke grinned. "Good, then we're doing our job right."

**HSMHSMHSM**

Gabriella fiddled with the pull strings on her sweatshirt, well Troy's sweatshirt. She sat on her bed wondering how long it would take him to figure out that the front desk would have extra keys. Slowly rising to her feet, Gabriella walked over to the window and stared out at the dark emptiness that was Santa Fe.

A click behind her sounded as the door opened. "Look Troy, I really don't want to talk to you right now. So can you please just go, someplace else?" her eyes focused on the outside world.

"It's a good thing I'm not Troy then."

She spun around so quickly that she knocked her hand the table next to her. Rubbing her hand, she held in a cry of pain as she looked at her brother. Her mind searched for something to say, but her mouth refused to speak.

"You going to say anything?" Luke asked as he stood in the middle of her hotel room.

Gabriella slowly walked over to him and slid her arms around his torso. He immediately encircled her shoulders and gently rocked her back and forth.

"I don't want it to be like last time Luke, I really don't."

"It wont be." He soothed her. "You're older, smarter…"

"Hornier." She said with a small giggle.

"That was something I really didn't need to know." He said as the broke apart. "As much as I don't want to see any guy within 10 miles of you, Troy's seems like he could be a pretty decent guy."

"Could be?"

"He is Troy after all, there's no way he'll be good. Not unless he gets anesthetics of something."

Gabriella giggled. "I think you mean amnesia."

"Oh, yeah…"

"Luke, I just want stuff to be good between us, boyfriend or no boyfriend."

He nodded his head. He pulled his sister in for another hug before he got up to leave. "Gabs?" he said as he reached the door.

"Yeah?"

"Everyone knows that you can handle everything by yourself, but just know that you don't have to."

"But it was David." She urged. "I finally had the chance to rip his face to pieces and Troy took that away from me."

"He didn't know. And it's up to you to let him know." He gently shut the door behind him.

Gabriella looked at the closed door and her eyes softened. "People who don't know me must think I'm a really over controlling jack ass."

"No one could ever think that about you."

Gabriella's head whipped towards the bathroom door. "How long have you been there?" she questioned him.

"I snuck in when you were talking to Luke. Thought it was the only way I would be able to able to get in here."

She sighed as he sat down on the bed with her. "I'm not sorry about getting mad at you for 'fighting for me honor.' But I am sorry about locking you out of the room."

"What was the big deal about that anyways?" Troy asked. "I thought girls liked when their boyfriends defended them."

Gabriella shook her head sternly. "Chivalry is dead. I can fight my own battles, thank you very much."

"But you don't have to."

"I know. So when the off chance comes along that I do need your help, I know you'll be there."

Troy slowly nodded his head, trying to piece together and understand the girl sitting across from him. "So we cool?"

"We're like a broken freezer. Not totally cool, but no where near warm."

A chuckle fell out of Troy's mouth. "Is that anything like your bacon reference?"

Gabriella let out a giggle. "Not really. See, I was pissed at when I talked about the bacon. But now I'm getting over being pissed at you. Totally different things."

"Well in that case…" Troy leaned over to Gabriella and gently kissed her collarbone.

A surge of energy flew through Gabriella's body as the connection between lips and skin was made. Troy slowly moved his lips up her neck, torturing her need for his mouth to be placed on top of her own.

By the time he reached the bottom corner of the right side of her mouth, Troy noticed her breathing had become short and heavy, just as he knew it would.

It felt like slow motion as he broke away the connection between the side of her mouth and his lips and gently place his lips in front of Gabriella's, barely touching. "That's for locking me out."

He jumped off the bed as Gabriella's eyes opened to a narrow glare. "That, Troy Bolton, was very unfair."

"That, Gabriella Montez, was payback. You should recognize it." He said with his signature smirk plastered on his face.

Gabriella leaped off the bed and lunged at Troy. He quickly dashed out the door with her close behind him. By the time the had reached the elevator, Gabriella had tackled him.

She situated herself on top of Troy with her hands on his chest and face as his hands rested on her back. "Just for your information, Bolton," she started. "I love bacon." His eyebrows perked up. "Really."

"You bet." Gabriella said with hungry eyes. She closed the space between his mouth and her own as fast as she could. Catching Troy off guard gave her the chance to be in charge of this kiss. She pressed open his lips with her tongue and rubbed his cheek softly with her hand.

* * *

**Author's Note: So this chapter was kind of mushy, but I hope it was still enoyable.**

**And remember, reviews are love :)**


	16. You have a moron list?

**Life In A Glass House**

**Chapter 16: You have a moron list?**

Gabriella sat at the foot of the bed shoving various items into her purse. She could feel the bed move as Troy crawled up behind her.

"So what do you want to do with our day off." He whispered hoarsely into her neck.

"The library." She stood up, letting Troy fall onto empty bed. "We all have a ton of homework."

Troy let out a groan. "The library? Girl are you serious?"

"Very much so." She flashed him a smile as she walked out the door. Gabriella happily walked down the hall with her book in hand.

A few minutes later she was walking on the sunny sidewalk. Her smile gleamed brightly as the thought of studying filled her mind.

"Whoa!" Gabriella found herself on the cement with her legs spread. Being eternally grateful for her mother's advice of always wearing long pants in a strange city, she took the hand in front of her. "Thanks."

"You looked pretty entranced there. You okay?"

Her books still clutched in her arm, she straightened flustered self. "I'll be fine. I was just thinking about studying and…" Gabriella's voice drifted off as she looked up at the man she ran into. The second her eyes met him, she pushed past him and continued her walk to the library.

He ran after her, "Come on aren't you going to talk to me?"

Gabriella kept her eyes looking forward. "I don't even want to look at you let alone talk to you." The boy grabbed her arm, causing her to jerk backwards. "Let go of me David."

"I think we should talk."

"I think I should inflict physical pain on you."

"That wasn't very nice."

"If you expected me to act pleasant to you then you are more of an idiot than even I thought. And you rank pretty damn high on my moron list." She yanked her arm away and continued her walk down the street.

He snickered as he walked beside her. "You have a moron list?"

"So not the point, but yes I do. You rank just above the guy who sits behind me in chemistry who hums show tunes."

"Ouch." He held his hand to his heart. "That hurt."

Gabriella stopped and turned to face him. She lifted up her arm and squeezed her fingers to the center of her palm. With a smirk, her fist knocked the side of his face. A squeal of joy escaped her as she turned her back towards him and continued on her way.

Moments later, he appeared by her side again. "Why the hell did you do that?"

"Because I didn't have the guts to do it back then."

"What are you talking about?"

"Hmm, I don't know. Think back to the summer after freshman year. Basketball camp." She spat bitterly.

"Oh…you still mad about that?" he asked.

Her mouth dropped. "We 'date' for six weeks and you told me you loved me. Then you sleep with three of the girls in my cabin and you have the nerve to tell me you still love me."

He smirked. "You gave up your precious virginity to me even after I confessed. You were ready to hop a plane with me to Vegas to get married."

"Chad stopped me from making the worst decision of my life even worse. Now you can either get the hell away from me or stick around and find out what it feels like to get your manhood ripped out. And no, I'm not just playin'." She continued to walk, leaving him behind her.

"Fine. But you'll be back Gabriella! You loved me, and that just doesn't go away!"

Her pace quickened and her anger rose. The grip on her books grew tighter with every step. Her breathes became deeper and more intense.

She couldn't take it anymore. A scream left her mouth at the same time her books left her hands.

"Damn girl. What's got you all hot and bothered?"

She snapped her head up, flipping her hair over her head. Chad crouched on the ground in front of her, picking up her books. She strode towards him and ripped them out of his grip. "I thought you weren't talking to me."

"I talked to Taylor and decided that I was being an idiot. You didn't do anything wrong and it was my idea to set you up with him."

She smiled. "Thank you. I'm glad you've finally seen the Gabriella colored light."

"Yeah, I guess you could put it like that." Chad cracked a smile. "So what cause the involuntary throwing of your precious books?"

"Two words. David Bauman." She said shortly as they walked down the street. "I ran into him a few minutes ago. And yes; I literally did run into him. Not one of my brightest moments."

"What happened?"

"He wouldn't leave me alone so I punched him and then I had the unfortunate task of explaining to him why I hit him. Then he told me that I still loved him."

Chad nodded his head. "That would explain the book throwing."

She nodded her head. "Uh, yeah."

"So how much does your hand hurt?"

Gabriella's eyes darted up at him. "Somewhere between excruciating and agonizing, but I think seeing him have a bruise on the side of his face will make it all worth it."

He chuckled and swung his arm around his friend. "That's the Gabriella I know and love."

"And you're the Chad that I loathe to love."

Chad gazed down at the girl beside her. "Is that an insult?"

"Figure it out." She winked at him and quickened her pace. As the library came into site, she stopped and turned around. "Chad!" she watched him shake his head, hair everywhere. "Thanks."

"For what?" he called back.

"For being my Chad. And for forgiving me when I really didn't do anything wrong."

He nodded as she started up the library steps. "Hey Gabi." She turned around and looked at him. "Troy's a lot smarter than he looks; don't dumb your life down just for him. And don't kill David," he watched as she rolled her eyes. "It would look bad on your permanent record."

She whipped herself around, "Comments taken into consideration."

&

Gabriella and Taylor handed the boys basketballs as they ran onto the floor.

"You do a good job tonight and they'll be a surprise waiting for you in the hotel room." Gabriella said with a smirk as Troy took a ball from her.

"I like the sound of that." He winked at her as he ran onto the court.

Taylor strolled to her friend's side and leaned in close. "You still haven't told him yet, have you?"

"Why mess with a good thing?" she asked rhetorically. "Troy and I have the start of something really great. Telling him would just mess it up."

"Honey, he's going to find out sooner or later-"

"If you give me a One Tree Hill reference I swear I'm going to smack you."

Taylor sighed. "Reference or not, he's going to find out and you know that."

"Just let me tell him when I'm ready, okay?" Taylor reluctantly nodded her head and Gabriella smiled, "Thank you."

The two girls stood underneath the basket throwing made shoots back to the team for ten minutes. As the warm ups came to an end, Gabriella saw Chad running towards her.

"Just giving you a heads up that David is on his way over." Chad said as he ran in place.

She scowled at him. "Yeah and you're the Queen of England."

He laughed and started to run back to the team. "I expect be addressed as your majesty from now on."

Gabriella rolled her eyes, picking up a loose ball. She turned around to be facing David. It made her want to kill Chad, but the want to kill him more overtook her. "You come any closer to me and you're going to have this ball shoved up your-"

"No need to be cruel Gabriella."

She snorted out a laugh. "Oh there's plenty need to be cruel."

David threw his arm around her shoulders. "Come on, it's been like what? A year and a half? Why don't we just let bygones be bygones and get to know each other again."

Gabriella put a sweet smile on her face and looked at him. "You know what, I think you are totally right."

His eyebrows rose. "Really?"

"Absolutely." Her voice became sweeter and softly. "I mean, me yelling at you and giving you this nasty bruise," she poked her finger at the black spot underneath his left eye. His face scrunched at the pain. "It was all totally uncalled for. I over reacted and I am truly sorry for that."

As a light pain held under his eye a small smile appeared on his face. "So what do you say, meet me in the back parking lot after the game."

Gabriella giggled and gently stoked the tip of his nose with her finger. "Totally." He grinned at her and she returned the favor. "And again, I'm really sorry about hitting you." She poked his bruise once again before trotting off to her seat on the bench next to Taylor who was looking at her in awe.

"What was that?" she asked with wide eyes.

"That was me getting rid of David." Taylor looked at her with unbelieving eyes. "He thinks he's meeting me in the parking lot after the game."

"That's your master plan to get him to stop talking to you? Wont it figure it out after you don't show up?"

Gabriella gave her a knowing smile. "He once waited for me for five hours to meet him by the docks so he could apologize to me."

"And?" Taylor urged.

She sighed. "And I only showed because I thought he looked really pathetic just skipping rock after rock after rock."

"Isn't that the night you, uh…"

Gabriella put her hand up to stop her friend from finishing the sentence. "The point is if he was willing to wait five hours just to say sorry with no idea that I would sleep with him, how long do you think he'll wait if he's almost positive it's going to be a booty call."

Taylor giggled. "Okay, I'll admit that's kind of good. But you've done better getting even with your brothers."

"They're easier targets." She explained. "I know their weaknesses and all fo their dirty little secrets."

"And what about Chad."

"Him too." Gabriella said without thinking. Taylor's eyes grew wide. "Oh no, I am not telling you anything about Chad."

Taylor groaned. "Why not? He's my boyfriend."

"And my best friend." She pointed out.

"You talking about me?"

Both girls' heads snapped up. Chad was standing before them with a basketball in hand.

"Maybe." Gabriella said.

"Then it's your majesty, remember?"

She sighed. "Go play the game."

Chad smiled and threw the ball to a teammate. "And Troy wants to talk to you during half time. It sounded kind of serious."

Both girls slumped back into their chairs. "Great." Taylor muttered.

"The last thing we need is for our star player to be worried about something."

"I was thinking more along the line of the fact that you're never going to tell me what you know about Chad."

&

Gabriella tapped her foot on the tiled floor outside the locker room. Waiting for Troy was like waiting for your grandmother to hand you your present at Christmas. Just when you think it's coming, it turn out to be someone else.

"Zeke." She called as he left the locker room. "Have you seen Troy? He wanted to talk at half time, but I couldn't so…"

He threw his bag over his shoulder. "He was pretty cut up about the loss, you know more than the rest of us. He took the back way out; said he was going to work on some three pointers."

Gabriella sighed. "Thanks Zeke, I'll see you back at the hotel." She slowly turned around and walked back into the gym. Lazily she pushed open the heavy metal doors. To her surprise Troy was standing by the three point line with a pair of cheerleaders from the other team; all three of them looking very flirty.

Her hip cocked out and her hand settled upon it. "Those look a lot more like eights than threes." The words barely escaped her mouth before her feet started on their strut towards her boyfriend. "Troy, can I talk to you for a second?"

His face was less shocked than she had hoped. "Uh…" his eyes motioned back and forth between the trio of girls.

"It a rhetorical question." Her hand gripped his wrist tightly as Troy waved a goodbye to the girls who winked back at him.

"What's wrong Gabriella?" he asked when she finally stopped moving.

Her eyes narrowed at his growing smirk. "Let's see, shall we? Chad gives me the message that you want to talk to me about something serious and then you doge me at half time. Then when I try to talk to you after the game I just happen to find you spreading your testosterone all over a pair of cheerleaders." Her temper had hit full height by the time the last word left her mouth.

"Spreading my testosterone…?" he questioned.

"Do not change the subject by pointing out my creative use of words." She said forcefully. "Just answer the question."

His mouth slightly fell open. "What question?"

"What were you doing flirting with those cheerleaders when you have a girlfriend who you supposedly care about?!"

"I don't know." Troy's smirk faded. "Maybe I did it for the same reason you were flirting with David Bauman right in front of your boyfriend that you supposedly care about."

In her mind, the conversation she had thought was going to happen had shattered. But her face stayed as strong, like always. "That was nothing. I was, I was getting back at him."

"What in the world do you get back at someone by flirting with them, hunh?"

"Stuff. Stuff in the past."

"The past?" his arms forcefully crossed across his chest. "Do you mean the past where he told you that you were still in love with him? Or are you thinking a little farther back to when he popped your cherry?"

Gabriella's defenses broke down. She took a few steps away from Troy. "So is that was this is all about? Some sick form of revenge for me not telling you the intimate details of my past."

"No, not really." He told her. "More like letting you know how awful it made me feel when Bauman came up to me at half time and explained all of this to me. And then he politely added the fact that you two were going to meet up after the game for some fun."

"So you decided I should feel the same way?"

Troy shrugged, taking steps backwards. "I don't know Gabriella. I really just don't know." Stressing the last two words, he turning his back towards her and left.

Gabriella couldn't bear to watch him leave, but her ears listened to his footsteps disappear into the night. As the silence set in, so did her emotions. Although no tears fell her body ached just the same.

**Author's Note: Yes, I know: MORE DRAMA! I can't help it :P I hope everyone liked this chapter.**


	17. Been there, done that, no thanks

**Life In A Glass House**

**Chapter 17: Been there, done that, no thanks**

Taylor stepped out of the shower to find Gabriella in the same place she was thirty minutes ago. "Gabi, you have to get up. We have a game today."

"They've lost the past three games. I doubt this one will be much different."

"And do you know why they've lost the last few games?"

Gabriella sat up in her bed. "No, but I'm sure you'll enlighten me."

"Because our best player has been obsessing over problems with his girlfriend instead of focusing on the game!"

"Oh, I guess I did know then." Gabriella said with a fake smile.

"Gabriella just make up with him!"

"No." she said sternly. "If he has a problem with me and my past then that's for him to deal with, not me."

Taylor sighed. "Why do you have to be so stubborn?"

"Why do you have to be so nosey?"

"Being nosey is my nature. It's what makes me Taylor."

Gabriella smiled. "Well then being stubborn is my nature. It's what makes me Gabriella."

"Fine. Don't make up with Troy." Taylor walked back into the bathroom with an arm full of clothes.

She shrugged and turned her attention back to the glowing TV. "I wont then."

A few minutes later, Taylor emerged dressed for a night on the town. "I'm going out with Chad before the game. Want to tag along?"

"And be a third wheel? Been there, done that, no thanks."

"Alright." She grabbed her purse and started for the door.

"Tay." Gabriella said quickly. "Thanks for changing rooms for me."

Taylor gave her a soft smile. "No problem Gabs. I'm here for you even if you don't want to get back together with him."

"That really touched my heart." Gabriella said with a giggle as Taylor shut their door. "My life is full of really nosey people."

As if queued, a knock came at her door.

"Speaking of." She clicked off the TV and climbed out of bed still wearing her pajamas paired with Troy's necklace. "Luke, I told you I don't want to talk about…" her voice drifted off as she opened the door.

"Hey." He said stiffly. His hands were shoved in his jean pockets.

She opened to door to let Troy in. He silently brushed past her and stood in the middle of the room. "What do you want, Troy?"

"I think I left some stuff in here." He told her. "Mind if I look around?"

Gabriella shrugged her shoulders and shut the door. She sat back down on the bed as he started to look around. Her eyes fallowed him like a hawk, studying his every move. "Why are you mad?" she finally asked.

"Excuse me?" He looked up from looking under the bed.

"I know why I'm mad. I just can't understand why you're mad."

He picked himself off the ground and sat on the end of the bed. "Gabriella, you practically kissed a guy I hate right in front of me. How am not supposed to be mad."

"I did it to get revenge on him. There were no feelings, except hatred."

Troy sighed. "That's pretty stupid id you ask me."

"Well, I didn't."

"Well you should have at least ran it by me so I didn't feel like such an idiot when Chad pointed out to me that my girlfriend was macking all over another guy."

"Macking?" she questioned. "Since when do you use words like macking?"

"I don't know. Days, weeks, months, it doesn't matter."

She nodded. "Right, it doesn't matter. Just like the fact that you were willing to throw the most horrific event of my life in my face doesn't matter. Oh wait, it does matter."

"I didn't mean to use it as an argument. It just happened to work out that way."

"Work out what way?" she screeched. "The way that leaves us both confused with the feeling like our hearts has been ripped out and shoved in a blender and put on frappe."

Troy jumped off the bed. "God Gabriella, when did you become so melodramatic?"

"Probably around the same time you turned into a jack ass."

"You know, I think you were right Gabriella." He told her. "We don't know each other. All this between us was only hot kisses and sarcastic conversations."

She sneered at him with a smirk on face. "Great. We agree." She stood up as he moved from his position.

Troy took a few long strides to place himself in front of Gabriella. His hands firmly grasped the back of her head and he forced his lips upon her own. Before long, they were both enlaced with each other. His hands were weaved through out her hair and her fingers were fumbling with his belt buckle.

He slowly leaned her back onto the bed, making sure not to losses contact with her soft lips. His tongue was dancing along the insides of her mouth, his throat letting light moans escape.

Gabriella ran her hands up his chest feeling his body that she couldn't get enough of. The shirt he was wearing now lay on the floor along with her own shirt. The both of them quickly removed the rest of their clothing. Letting the other explore their own body, surges of pleasure were sent through both bodies that hand tangled together underneath the sheets.

**&**

Gabriella moved around the bed slightly. Her leg slipped out from under the cover of the blanket sending a cold shiver up her body. The cold woke her better than an alarm clock had ever done.

After a few moments the realization that her clothes weren't on her body, but on the floor, had drifted into her mind. The only thing on her body was Troy's necklace, but Troy was out of sight.

She sat up and looked around the room through the bushel of hair that hung in front of her face. On the ground were her clothes. On the table beside her were the remains of that afternoon: an open condom wrapped.

A heavy sigh worked its way up her chest and out her mouth. Keeping the sheet wrapped around her, Gabriella pushed herself out of bed and slowly she walked into the bathroom.

After a long shower, she emerged feeling immensely better than when she had entered. With a new set of clothes on her body and her hair pulled back into a perfectly messed up pony tail she left her hotel room.

Waiting for the elevator she fingered Troy's necklace, reliving the last six words he had spoken to her, "only hot kisses and sarcastic conversations." He definitely had the hot kisses part right.

"Hey Gabs."

She snapped out of her trance and looked up. "Hey Luke. You ready for the big game?"

"Totally." He said with a huge grin on his face. Seeing her brother's smile made Gabriella smile as well. "Coach told us if we don't win, we're out. But I know we can win this one."

"That's good." She said with a nod of her head. "I'm not ready to go home yet." That was a lie. All she wanted was to go home and tell Sarah all of her problems, but she couldn't let her brother know. "Do you know where Troy is?"

"I was actually going to ask you the same thing." He said as they stepped into the elevator. "He wasn't at the pre game pep talk a half hour ago and nobody's seen him all day.

She nodded, taking in the information. She honestly had no idea if she had been with Troy forty minutes ago of five hours ago. "I don't know. Let's hope he shows up for the game."

"Or not. With the way he's been playing we'll do a lot better without him." Luke told her as they strolled into the elevator, letting the doors close behind them.

"What do you mean?"

"Come on Gabriella, you saw the way he played the last few games. Ever since you two broke up, he's been playing like crap."

She crossed her arms across her chest uncomfortably. "He did just fine before he ever met me. There's no reason he should be any less of player."

"He's not less of a player. He's less of a guy." Luke dashed out of the elevator as the doors open. As he reached the middle of the lobby his strides stopped and he turned around. "I almost forgot, happy birthday little sis!"

He mouth hung open. Today was her birthday. She stood in front of the doors, dumbfounded at the fact that she had forgotten her own date of birth.

"Miss Montez?"

She slowly looked over at the hotel receptionist standing next to her.

"A young man wanted me to give this too you."

The lady handed her a folded up piece of paper and returned back to her desk. Gabriella unfolded the note and read it carefully.

_Gabriella-_

I know what just happened between us was great but unexpected. As for the state of our relationship, it's not going to change anything. We are too different for this to ever really work out. I think deep down we both know that, but it's too bad that it took someone like David Bauman to make us figure it out.

-Troy

She reread the note a dozen. In the time it had taken the team to leave for the game, it had taken the note to sink in. With wide strides, she ran to the receptionist's desk and handed her the note.

"Can you read this and tell me what you think it means?"

She gently held the note in her hand. "Miss, I really don't think this is my place…"

"No, I want you to. It's okay. Honesty is the best policy."

The lady sighed and scanned the note as quickly as she could. "It sounds like a break up note to me."

Gabriella slammed her hand down on the table causing the woman across from her to jump. "Exactly! He is breaking up with me." the receptionist peered at Gabriella with a curios gaze. "He was the one that kissed me. He was the one that forced my two best friends to set us up. He was the one that kept flirting with me when I obviously had better things to do. Okay, yes I kissed him back and maybe flirted a little bit. But the point is that he was the one who pursed me. I should be the one to break us up, not him! Right?"

The receptionist continued to stare at Gabriella.

She was about to continue her speech, but she was cut off by the sudden feeling of her legs being swept out from underneath her. Gabriella was floating above a crowd.

"Happy birthday sis!"

Gabriella looked down to find out that she was on the shoulders of Trevor and Scott with Cole, Luke, and Kevin beaming up at her.

"How does it feel to be one year older?" Scott asked.

Her eyebrows raised. "Do you guys really want me to answer that?"

The shoulders she was sitting on started to move forward, catching her by surprise. She leaned backwards only to remember that there was no support behind her. The grip on her legs loosened and she floated through the air into a pair of arms. With wide eyes, she smiled. "Thanks Cole."

He laughed as he set her down on the tiled floor. "Looks like you haven't gotten anymore coordinated in your older years."

She playfully punched his arm. "You guys know better than to lift me." Gabriella walked next to her brothers. "Despite my stellar coordination on the court, my balancing is not so great." Her brothers laughed, making her grin from ear to ear. "So where's the rest of the family?"

"Mom and Dad pawned Jason and Ian off at friend's houses." Cole told her.

"Which means that they have the house all to themselves to celebrate their anniversary this weekend." Trevor added.

She closed her eyes tightly. "Ew! I hate having my birthday so close to their anniversary."

"But since this is their 25th they decided to go on a small vacation to Vegas." Scott said.

"Which means that the Montez kids have to house to themselves!" Luke slapped his brothers' hands in excitement. "What damage should we do?" he asked mischievously.

"None." Gabriella said sternly. "The last time they left us alone we almost broke a wall in addition to a hole in the floor."

"They never found out what happened." Cole said. "We had everything cleaned up."

Gabriella stared at her clueless brothers. "That was three years ago. Ever wonder why they stopped going to Dad's conventions when everything was paid for?"

As if five lights flicked on at the same time, the five boys let out a synchronized "Ohhhhhhhh."

A giggle escaped her mouth triggering the last time she giggled. She and Troy were entangled in her sheets and he had just bit the skin on her collarbone. She wasn't sure if the memory was a fond one or not. But she did know that it was a memory that she didn't want her brothers to ever find out about.

"Gabriella…Yoo hoo…" Kevin's hand waved in front of her face snapped her back into real time. "You totally zoned out."

Her mouth fell open. "Uh, yeah. I, uh, was just thinking about past birthdays and how fun they were."

"Scott's 18th tops all of them!" Trevor exclaimed, throwing his long arms into the air.

She sighed of relief as her brothers agreed and delved into their own memories of that night. Thank goodness for short attention spans and party-centric minds.

* * *

**Author's Note: Not much for me to say about this chapter except that I plan to update more often now that school is out for the summer (woohoo!!)**

**Reviews are always loved.**


	18. Save your breath bro

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 18: Save your breath bro**

Taylor and Gabriella stood in the gym at half time. Her brothers sat on the other side of the gym while the team was gathered in the locker room.

"Looks like we might be able to scrape up a win." Taylor said as she examined her clip board like she did every game. "Mostly because Troy hasn't shown up yet." Gabriella nodded her head once in silence. "Do you have any idea where he might be?"

She slumped back in her chair. "Don't know." She said honestly, her voice monotone. "Don't care."

"Gabs I know that you're mad at him, but that doesn't mean you don't have to pretend you don't care about him."

"I'm not pretending." She told him. "At this moment I couldn't care less about Troy Bolton and his whereabouts."

Taylor took a deep breath. "Is there something you haven't-"

Gabriella pushed her chair back and stood up. "I'm going to go get a drink of water. Okay? Okay." She left before Taylor had a chance to answer.

She could feel the watchful eyes of her brothers follow her as she left the gym. She knew the only reason they weren't following her was because it was her birthday… and what a birthday it had been "Could this day get any worse?"

"I think I know a way that it could get better."

Not expecting anyone to answer, she jumped, almost knocking over a tower of basketballs in the process.

"Are you always this uncoordinated, because I heard you were pretty well off on the court."

Her hair flipped over the top of her head as she finally looked up. "Yeah, and where did you hear that?" she asked.

The boy shrugged and pulled his hands out of his sweat pants pockets. "Around. You know how that goes."

She grunted a small laugh. "Unfortunately I do." He took a step closer to her and stuck out his hand. As he started to introduce himself, she started talking again. "Nathan Wright, number 23 for Lakeside High." She rattled off. "I know who you are."

He laughed. "I guess you do. And I guess you won't be creeped out that I know who you are." Her eyebrows in disbelief. "Gabriella Montez, manager for East High."

Gabriella crossed her arms, "Won't you get in trouble for talking to a member of the team that you're playing against?"

"Won't you?"

He had a point. "What do you want?"

"I want to invite you to a party. I'm sure it will make your day better." He took a few steps backwards. "Meet me right here after the game."

She watched him slowly turn and run into the gym with the rest of his team. "Maybe a good party is just what I need." Gabriella took a drink of water before going back into the gym.

As she walked past the locker room, every eye of the East High basketball team was watching her. They had seen. "Gabriella." Luke started in a stern voice.

"Save your breath bro. I'm going no matter what you say." She said without breaking her stride. Behind her she heard murmurs of the team's objections behind her, but it didn't faze her. After getting Troy's note, it seemed like nothing could ever faze her again.

She took her seat next to Taylor and blindly watched the two teams warm up. Her eyes seemed to be drawn to Luke who was conversing with her other brothers in the stands; not one of them looking particularly happy, excited, or any other emotion that would involve smiling.

In Gabriella's mind, the end of the game couldn't come soon enough.

**&**

Troy shoved his hands in his pockets and walked into the nearly empty gym. He had watched his team win without him and he had watched Gabriella run off with a player from the other team.

A loose ball rolled to his feet. Out of habit, he picked in up and shot it towards the hoop. The ball circle the hoop a few times before it fell outside of the net and into the hands of his best friend.

"Maybe it's a good thing you didn't play tonight." He threw the ball and into the net. "We might not have won." Troy shrugged ands stayed silent as Chad walked towards him. "Where were you tonight man?"

"Around." Troy said vaguely. "I had some stuff to think about."

Chad shoved the ball into his stomach. "Yeah, sure. Now tell me the truth."

"It's the truth." He defended himself. "I think I just made a big mistake and I don't know how to fix it."

He chuckled, "Yeah, right. What did you do? Sleep with Gabriella?"

Troy's face fell. "How can you tell?" he asked nervously.

Chad stopped laughed. "What?"

"I mean if you can tell, then that means that Luke and Cole can probably tell and I do not want…well, I think you know what I'm getting at."

"I didn't know!" Chad exclaimed. "I was joking, but apparently…… Oh my God! You slept with Gabriella!"

"Shhh!" Troy said hastily. "It's not something I really want to broadcast."

"You two are broken up. You're not supposed to do that with people you are, well were, broken up with." Troy's eyebrows rose. "You're still broken up?"

Troy nodded, "Yeah. That part is completely my fault. I actually really want to talk to her."

"She left right after the game." Chad told him.

"I know. Do you know where she went?"

"She went to some party with a guy from the other team." Troy's eyes narrowed. "Who?"

Chad shrugged. "Number 23. I don't know his name. But her brother's were pretty pissed about the situation. I bet they know who he is."

"Thanks." Troy turned to leave, Gabriella's brothers in his sight.

"Troy." Chad leaned in close. "So you really….?"

He nodded and smiled slightly. "Yeah, I did."

Chad grabbed Troy's hand. "Nice man."

He chuckled and turned back around. But his smile faded when he approach the group of guys sitting on the bleachers. "Hey guys. You know who Gabriella ran off with."

"Nathan Wright," Luke answered. "What's it to you."

"I need to find her."

"Yeah, well join the club." Cole said bitterly.

"You're welcome to join the hunt." Trevor added.

Troy nodded in gratitude. "I have an idea of where she might be. I'll call you if I see her."

They nodded as he left. Troy quickly grabbed the first taxi he saw, giving the driver a street name. He knew where the party was held. It was where every after party was held for Lakeside. Luke must have been too drunk to remember from the year before.

"Thanks." He handed the cab driver a fist full of money as the bright lights from the loud house shone on him. It was definitely a party house.

He walked inside to find various people connected at the mouth with various items of clothing missing from their person. The further he moved into the house, the more he began to worry about Gabriella.

"Nathan!" he called out as the boy came into his sight. "Where's Gabriella?"

He stared at Troy and took a drink out of his red cup. "I don't know who you're talking about Bolton."

"The girl you brought. Where is she." He demanded.

"Oh her." He rolled his eyes and pointed down a hallway. "The little slut ran off with one of the guys from Jefferson."

Troy grabbed his shirt and shoved his against the wall; beer from the cup spilling over both of them. "Don't call her that." He said in a threatening voice.

He shook his hands away from the shirt and pushed his way down the hall. "Gabriella!" he called, backing on every door. "Gabriella!"

The door at the end of the hall was locked. Troy jiggled and handled and knocked on the door, but all he got was a mumbled call of occupancy. As fast as his fingers would let him, he sent a text message to Chad, insisting backup.

With his phone securely back in his pocket, Troy lifted up his leg and kicked the door as hard as he could. Sure enough, the door fell and a body from the bed popped up.

"Get out of here, man!" he called furiously.

In a rage of anger, Troy grabbed David and threw him against the wall without a word. As David got to his feet, Troy threw a punch that hit his jaw. At first glance, it had much promise to do more damage that Gabriella's punch had done.

Troy ran to the bed where Gabriella laid unmoving, but thankfully still clothed. "Gabi!" he shook her gently. "Gabriella, wake up!"

She turned over and groaned. "Help me, Troy." Her words were barely auditable, but they were all that Troy needed.

He turned around and gave David another quick punch, pushing him back onto the ground. "You stay the hell away from her."

He leaned down to the bed and pushed the hair out of her face. "Oh, Gabriella…" he whispered. "Gabriella…" His arms slid under her fragile body and he carried her out of the room.

On his through the party, he saw Chad run in with a frantic look on his face.

"Back room." Troy said simply. His best friend dashed through the party in search of David.

Troy continued his way out of the party and saw his cab sitting where he left it. He carefully opened the door and slid her into the seat. "Uh, the hotel with the really weird French name." Troy told the driver.

As the driver started up the car, he looked down at Gabriella. She was curled up in the seat next to him. Her body looked so fragile as he laid motionless.

"Gabriella." He gently shook her shoulders. "Gabriella," He pulled her up, putting her face next to his own. "You have to stay awake."

Her head fell to his shoulder. "Troy…" the word sputtered out of her mouth in between breaths.

He pulled her close to him as the car came to a stop. Troy eased both of them out of the car and carefully carried her into the hotel lobby. His heart started to beat faster as the thought that one of her brothers could very well be around entered his mind.

"What the heck are you doing?"

He looked up at the fiery girl in front of him. "Angie, what are you doing here?"

"I came down with Kevin, you know my boyfriend." She said, as if it should have been obvious. "Now, I'm going to ask you again: what the heck are you doing?"

"I need to get Gabriella up to my room."

She snorted a laugh. "Yeah, looks like little Miss Good Girl had too much to drink. What was it, two beers? One and a half?"

Troy glared at her. "Just go up to Kevin's room and don't say a word about this. Not Kevin or any of the other Montez's."

She smirked. "Fine, I'll just go up Kevin's room and not talk. It should be lots of fun." She brushed past him towards a set of elevators on the other side of the lobby.

"That's not what I meant!" he called. "In fact, please don't!"

She waved a hand above her head, but continued to walk away from him.

Troy sighed and looked down at the limp girl whop still resided in his arms. He gently walked her into the elevator and back into the hallway where his and Chad's room was. With more luck than skill, he managed to open up the door without dropping her or banging her head on the door frame.

He set her down on the bed and gazed upon her gentle face. "Gabriella…" he said once again. "I'm so sorry. This is all my fault." The truth leaving his mouth felt like a punch in the gut. "I should have never done it. It was stupid and…" his voice drifted off as her eyes fluttered open. They only stayed that way for a second. "Gabriella…"

* * *

**Author's Note: Sorry about the lack of updates. My summer has been a lot busier then I thought it would be. Plus, I've been a little bad and have been starting other stories before finishing this one ;)**

**Anyways, please review! It what keeps me going :-D**


	19. Did you change my clothes?

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 19: Did you change my clothes?**

Chad burst through the hotel room door. "Ruffies." He announced. "He gave her ruffies."

Troy sat silently looking at Gabriella. A position he hadn't moved from in thirty minutes. Every bone in his body wanted to back to that party, but his mind was fixated on staying by her side.

"David sends his condolences in the form of cash." Chad pulled a wad of cash out from his pocket and threw it on the bed. "Want me to go buy some coffee or something for her?"

He finally looked up. "No…" he said softly. "I'll do it. You can stay with her." With one last, long look at Gabriella he grabbed the cash.

"Hey." Chad stopped his before he got to the door. "Don't do something stupid. Stay away from the party."

He brushed past his friends without any kind of acknowledgement.

Within five minutes, Troy was at the nearest grocery store. Mindlessly he walked up and down the isles, no clue what he was looking for.

"Hey cuz." A peppy voice greeted him. "How's it going with passed out girl?"

He slowly looked over at his cousin. His eyes wandered down her arm to her hand. She was holding a box of Trojans. "Please tell me you aren't here to buy condoms."

She sighed and placed the box back on the shelf. "Sadly, I'm not." Troy let out a heavy breath of relief. "We got hungry and apparently even at the nicest of hotels there isn't room service at midnight."

Troy looked at his watch, shaking his head. "I didn't know it was so late."

"If you're starting to think that midnight is late then Gabriella has you on a really short leash." Angie said with a smirk. She watched his emotion go from worried to shattered. "But seriously, how is she doing."

"According to the internet she should be better in about five to eight hours."

Angie's eyebrows rose in confusion. "Internet…? But you know how long hangovers…"

"She was drugged." Troy said simply. "Her ex gave her ruffies."

Her mouth dropped, but her eyes moved from Troy's to the space behind him. "Kevin…"

Troy spun around in time to see Kevin drop a six pack of soda and a bad of chips onto the ground. "Where is he?"

"Doesn't matter." Troy said sternly.

Kevin took a step forward, sandwiching Angie between himself and Troy. "Where is he? And where is Gabriella?" he asked again.

"It doesn't matter Kevin. I took care of it."

Kevin took another step forward, but Angie put up her hand. "If Troy says it doesn't matter, then it doesn't Kev."

"Angie, it's my sister! Of course it matters."

"Look," Troy said, pushing his little cousin out of the way. "Chad and I already took care of him. He won't be coming around anymore. She's in good hands."

Kevin shook his head. "I'm not my brothers. I'm not oblivious to the world around me. I know you and Gabi broke up and changed rooms. I know that she only went to that stupid party because she was upset with you and wanted to get away from it all. She never would have done something so careless otherwise, especially not on her birthday."

Troy's head dropped, "It was her birthday?" he asked quietly.

"Yeah. And I know her better than anyone else in the family, so let me see her."

Without a word, Troy grabbed a sack of coffee beans and headed for the cashier. Both Angie and Kevin in tow.

The three walked back with the other sound being the patter of their footsteps on the pavement.

"I'm going to go back to the room." Angie said quietly as the elevator door opened. "And Kevin, don't blow up. Same goes for you Troy."

The boys watched the doors close on her person. "She's probably still sleeping." Troy muttered. "And you don't want to try to wake her."

Kevin nodded silently and pushed open the door. His eyes first landed on Chad who had fallen asleep on the other bed. They moved towards the bed that held his big sister. The blanket on top of her barely moved with her breaths. He turned to Troy, "She's going to be okay, right?"

Troy nodded his head slowly. "Yeah, she'll be fine."

The boy's face fell and his body went limp, but Troy didn't take his eyes off of the girl in the bed.

**&**

Gabriella stared to sit up in the bed, but the dark room around her went into overdrive. She quickly returning to her lying position. Stretching her peripheral vision to its limit, she looked around the room. There was a person in the lounge chairs and someone about to fall off of the other bed.

Slowly, she tried to sit up again. Gabriella was sure that someone was standing next to her and that person was hitting with a heavy mallet, but no one was there. As the fuzziness of the room became clear she saw her little brother and her best friend; both looking as exhausted as she felt.

"You don't remember anything, do you?"

Quickly she spun her head around and swiftly realized that it was a bad decision. Her eyes closed and her head hands rested upon her pounding head.

"Drink this."

Blindly, she held out her hand and a bottle fell into her grasp. "Thanks Troy." She muttered.

His eyes raised and his mouth opened, but much like every other conversation with Gabriella, he was cut off.

"I've spent days upon days with you, Troy." She said lightly. "I know you. I know you're voice."

"I should have guessed that. It's the same with me."

Gabriella finally opened her eyes and saw him standing by the door, watching her. "Since you know me so well I'm sure you'll be able to tell me what happened last night."

Troy slowly walked towards the bed and sat down next to her. "You went to that party and David offered you a drink. A few minutes later you ditched your date and went with him to one of the rooms. You were pretty out of it, but he wasn't going to stop anytime soon."

Gabriella shook her head, realizing the memory would never come to her.

"He gave you ruffies, Gabriella."

She continued to shake her head. "I can't believe it." His hand reach out and she fell into his arms. "Thank you Troy. Thank you for saving me."

He rubbed her back gently, taking in the smell of her hair. His mind raced for the any words to say, "How did you know I was the one that saved you."

She sighed and buried herself into his neck. "Because you're the one who was waiting for me to wake up."

They pulled apart, "I'm sorry that they found out."

Gabriella pushed him back. "You save me and you're worried about my little brother and my best friend finding out?" she exclaimed. "You are absolutely the weirdest person I have ever met."

"Kevin isn't the only brother that knows…" Troy's voice trailed off.

Her four older brothers burst through the hotel door. They jumped onto the bed and bombarded her with questions.

"Gabriella! Are you okay?"

"What were you thinking?"

"How are you feeling?"

"Do you know how stupid that was?"

"Did he do anything to you?"

"How could you have let this happen?"

Chad and Kevin stirred and Gabriella put her hands up. "Stop, please. I don't even know what happened last night. But from what I've heard," her eyes glanced over at Troy, "You should be praising Troy for rescuing me."

Luke put an arm on Troy's shoulder. "Thanks man."

Scott nodded his head. "I don't know what we would do without our little sister."

"You are the best boyfriend that we could have ever hoped for her."

Gabriella and Troy looked at each other before looking back at her brothers. "Ex-boyfriend." They said in unison.

"What?" Chad exclaimed from behind them. "You guys are still… what the hell is going on with this world?"

"Well this conversation just got a whole lot more awkward." Trevor noted.

"How you two can sleep together and have Troy rescue you and still be broken up is beyond me."

"What!" Her brothers screeched.

"Thanks Chad…" Gabriella said lightly. She managed to push her brothers and Chad out of the room, leaving herself and Troy alone.

They sat in the same place, not talking for what seemed like hours. And they very much could have.

The sun was now shining through the windows and the sounds hustles of people on the street before filled the air.

"I still think it's a good idea that we broke up." Gabriella said.

Troy nodded. "Me too."

"Although I think it's really crappy that it was all instigated by you." she said with a small snap in her voice.

His eyebrows rose. "What is that supposed to mean."

"You were the one that chased me down and tried to force me to go out with you."

"I did not force you to do anything."

Gabriella ignored his comment. "And then you leave me a note with the hotel receptionist? If that isn't crappy, then I don't know what is."

"Oh, come on! How was I supposed to know that we would end up arguing a bunch and just fixing everything with… with… with a game of tonsil hockey?"

"Because that's how it was before we got together!" her voice rose.

"That's right! We got together. The two of us. We both made that decision. So the fact that I brought up the breakup isn't bad at all."

She crossed her arms in frustration. "Fine. It isn't that bad, but it still holds a certain level of crappiness."

"So we going to kiss like we do after every argument." His comment was only slightly sarcastic.

Gabriella pushed herself off the bed, realizing for the first time that she was not in the same outfit was the night before. "Did you change my clothes?"

Troy rolled his eyes. "Chill out. I left you're bra and stuff on, so I didn't see anything." Her eyes narrowed at him, waiting for the second wind of the comment. And then it came, "But it's not like I haven't seen you naked before."

She grabbed a pillow and hit him in the head with it before she walked to the door. "And that wasn't a sexy, naked pillow fight type of hit." Gabriella ripped the door open and saw Angie in front of her.

"Gabriella, you're up!" she said happily. "Troy wanted me to bring you some breakfast, do you want any?"

She smiled politely. "No thanks. I'll see you in class Angie."

"Oh, and we have a test in Calc next week."

She sighed, "Thanks."

**&**

"Please stay Gabriella!" Taylor exclaimed. "It's only a few more days."

"Taylor, I am going home early and there is nothing you do or say to stop me." She shoved a pile of clothes into her duffle bag.

"Troy will be here." She said with a hopeful smile.

Gabriella turned around and stared at her friend. "Not a selling point."

"Okay fine, bad thing to say. But you're brothers will be at home and you don't want to have to face them after everything."

Gabriella shook her head. "I cannot believe Chad blurted to them. And to you for that matter."

Taylor's eyes rose. "Really?"

She sighed. "Okay, I can believe it. But it still sucks all the same."

"Then stay here and be sad! It will so much easier avoiding one versus avoiding four."

"The sooner the better." She told her friend. "Plus I have an idea on how to keep them quiet about the whole ordeal."

"And what would that be?"

"If everything goes right you won't hear about any of it." She smirked as she shoved another pile of clothes into the bag. "And that's the beauty of it."

Taylor shrugged. "Fine, don't tell me. Don't tell me like you didn't tell me about you and Troy when I specifically asked if there was something you weren't telling me."

"Tay, it's not like I wanted to think about it. And you bringing up Troy, forcing me to think about it, was not helping."

She stared lightly at her friend with a slight smirk on her face. "So was it good?"

Gabriella zipped her bag shut and turned to look at her friend. The more she looked at Taylor's smirk, the more a matching one speared on her own face. "Maybe a little…" she said mysteriously.

Taylor raised her eyebrows.

Gabriella's smirk slowly turned into a smile. "Maybe it was great."

* * *

**Author's Note: Whoa, that was a heavy chapter, but I feel it needed to be done. The next one is a lot lighter (well, it will be once I write it, lol)**

**Comments are absolutely loved!!**


	20. He's a classy fellow

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 20: He's a classy fellow**

Gabriella had taken refuge at Chad's house that day after school. It was the first day of school after the basket ball players had returned to school. Which meant three things: the school was in a frenzy due to the fact that East High had won state despite the way Troy played, Luke was looking for her and wanting to talk, and Troy was in first period once again and he was still her partner.

After an appalling day at school and a relief brought by Chad's house, Gabriella opened the front door of her house, waiting for a comment. Any comment.

"Hey Gabi, you have a phone message."

That was the last comment she was expecting.

"From who?" she pealed off her coat and leaned against the couch.

Cole didn't bother to move his eyes from the video game that was in front of himself and Trevor. "Troy."

If she was thinking clearly she would have sworn her heart jumped a beat "Really?"

He shook his head. "No."

Her bright eyes turned into a glare. Gabriella reached over the couch and smacked her brother in the back of the head, causing his hat to fall into his face.

"It was worth it." He said simply. The two brothers bumped fists, still not taking their eyes off of the TV screen.

Gabriella crossed her arms. "Where is everybody else?" she asked harshly.

"Mom and Dad took the little ones to something at their school and everyone else is around."

"Great." She snapped.

Gabriella was officially a girl on a mission. She stomped up the stairs and ripped open a door that had music blasting through the walls. She grabbed Kevin's arm and ripped him from his iPod.

"What the hell, Gabriella?"

She towed him down the stairs and threw him on the couch next to Cole and Trevor. "Sit."

Making her way into the kitchen, she saw Scott sitting on the counter with a chicken leg in his mouth. With a handful of his t-shirt, she pulled him into the living room and threw him onto the couch as well.

"Stay." She stormed out to the backyard and found Luke shooting hoops.

"You were getting pretty good at avoiding me, but let me tell you; this isn't the brightest idea." He told her. Ignoring his comment she reached up, grabbed his ear, and pulled him down. He walked down at her level behind her.

"What are you doing?"

She threw him onto the couch next to everyone else. "Now, I'm calling a family meeting." She said calmly.

The five boys looked past her. She turned around and turned off the TV behind her.

Trevor threw down his controller. "You have our attention. What?" he asked, annoyed.

"There are certain events that happened this weekend that I do not want getting out to mom, dad, any other family member, anyone at school, or any person on this planet for that matter."

"Why," Luke started. "What ever do you mean?"

She narrowed her eyes. They weren't going to make this easy. "Dad will not find out about me sleeping with Troy and Mom will not find out about me getting drugged at a party. And vise versa."

Each boy shifted uncomfortably on the couch. "What's in it for us?"

"The angel child getting knocked down a peg?" Scott raised his eyebrows. "Sounds good to me."

"If even just one of you breaths a word then I will make you're lives a living hell. Each and every one of you."

"How do you expect to do that?"

She smirked a knowing smirk. "I have dirt on all of you. Stuff that will make you cringe."

Each of them stared at her; challenging her.

"Trevor." She turned to her oldest brother. "Remember when you pledged to be in a fraternity freshman year? You know, the one time in you're life you weren't picked?" she asked with a smirk.

He nodded his head slowly.

"If you spill, I'll tell your girlfriend, Lucy, that the only reason you ever asked her out was a pledge dare to ask out a less than seven. But not only were you to ask her out, you were to hook up with her and take a picture and or video as proof." Her smirk grew. "You only chose one measly picture taken with your phone, but I doubt she'll take that as good news."

Trevor sank into the couch as the other four brothers gaped at the news.

"Scott, I'll tell your friends at work what his real name is." She watched her brother's mouth fall. "And I'll tell them why our parents named you that."

"Why?" Kevin urged.

"Glad you asked. Mom and Dad's five year anniversary was in Scotland and that's where big bro here was conceived."

"Ohhh, she got you good!" Cole exclaimed with a smile taking over his face.

Gabriella turned to the next brother. "Cole, remember when you said you were going to visit Aunt Matilda last year? Remember that you really went up to Anaheim and snuck into Disneyland to, successfully, punch Peter Pan because he made out with your ex-girlfriend, twice removed."

Cole pulled the bill of his baseball hat over his face.

"And Luke… when you and your friends were going to San Diego for 'Basketball Camp' you all were really going down to Tijuana to get laid and drunk. And ya'll were successful at both."

She turned her attention to Kevin and Luke turned bright red at the thought of that fact getting to his parents.

"And what do you have on me Gabi?" Kevin challenged his sister. "I've never been to Disneyland or a fraternity house, Kevin is my full name and I don't drink and I'm still a virgin." His older brothers smirked at the last comment, but Gabriella stayed strong.

"You used to wet the bed."

"A lot of people used to wet the bed."

"I doubt your girlfriend will see it like that, but I'll continue for your sake. If anyone of you spills, Angie will learn that a few weeks ago you decided to do laundry in the middle of the night just to cover up the fact that you had a bad dream and soiled yourself."

Her argument was done and each one of her brothers was shocked and a light shade of red resembling a strawberry.

"So are we clear?" she asked rhetorically. "If you have any questions, I'll be in my room." Gabriella sauntered past her brothers with a smile on her face.

**&**

That night Gabriella sat up in her bed, staring out her window. The moonlight shone through her window like a spotlight on a stage. It almost seemed fated that someone would come tapping at her window, awaiting a conversation with her.

But the knock came from the other side of her door.

She sighed and stumbled out of her. The cool air hit her sending a shiver up her spine and back down it.

"What do you want?" she asked dreamily as she opened the door.

Luke leaned against her doorframe. "How did you know all of that stuff?"

Gabriella rolled her eyes and went back to her bed. "I pay attention." She said shortly. "And you guys do a lot of stupid stuff."

He followed her and sat on the edge of her bed. "Are you okay?"

"Okay, about what?" she questioned with a spring in her voice. "Am I okay about getting drugged at a party? Am I okay about me and Troy breaking up? Or am I okay about sleeping with Troy after we broke up with the fact that he is my dance partner lingering over my head?"

"Um, all of it."

"Yeah, I'm okay." She said softly. "I'm a little shaken up from everything happening all at the same time. But all in all, I'm good."

"I worry about you, you know?"

She nodded. "Yeah I know. And if that's all you wanted, I would really like to go back to sitting by myself in the dark."

Luke nodded and leaned over to his sister. He kissed her forehead gently. "Good luck tomorrow at school."

She nodded as he left and watched the door shit behind her. He had been gone for at least three minutes before the thought hit her.

"What the hell does that mean?"

She threw the covers off once again and crossed the hallway into her brothers' room.

"Luke." She whispered hoarsely. "Luuuuuuke."

"Gabi, what the heck are you doing?" Cole asked from across the room.

"I'm looking for Luke."

"Obviously." He spat. "And he isn't here."

Gabriella's eyes rose. "I just talked to him four minutes ago, how can he not be here?"

"He probably went to Austin's party."

She nodded and sat down on Cole's bed. "Why aren't you there?"

"I have a huge government test and I need to be awake for it." She continued to nod. "Which means I need to get some sleep now." Gabriella sat there, still nodding. "Leave, Gabi. Now."

"Oh." She quickly stood up. "Night then…"

Her mind was too awake to go back to sleep, so Gabriella stood in the hallway. As the dim night light shone into the hallway from another bedroom, she let out a heavy sigh. The more she thought about her brothers, Troy, and her life, the less they all made sense.

**&**

Gabriella sleepily walked into the gym the next morning. With energy leaving her body every step, she fell down to the floor. Her eyes squeezed shut as the lights above her gleamed brightly.

"Did you go to the party last night?" Taylor asked.

"No." she groaned. "But apparently Luke did.

"So did Chad. He showed up at school in yesterday's clothes."

She smiled lightly. "He's a classy fellow."

Taylor giggled. "That he is."

"I just ended up staying up half the night waiting for my night in shining armor to throw a rock at my window and then I stayed up the other half of the night thinking about my life and how much it sucks at this current moment in time."

"Then you probably wont want me to tell you that I don't think this floor has been washed recently enough for you to be lying on it.

Gabriella shot up off the floor and stood next to Taylor. "Well, I feel dirty."

"Might want to keep those thoughts to yourself." Taylor nudged her side. "The boys are coming."

Gabriella faked a smile as Troy showed up at her side.

"Gabriella." He said shortly, pushing his long sleeve shirt up to his elbows.

"Troy." She replied.

"Have a good night?" he asked.

"Fine, you?"

"Great, in fact."

"Party was that good?" she asked, her eyes barely focused on his face.

"Outstanding." He forced a smile onto his face and tilted his head to the side for extra effect.

She tilted her head the opposite way and matched his smile. "Well that's just dandy."

"Isn't it though?"

Gabriella opened her mouth but Coach Bolton cut her off.

"Men and ladies," he shot a smile at Taylor who nodded her head, smiling. "Today we will be practicing the art of…" he looked at his clip board with a confused look overcoming his face. "some Spanish dance. Since Mrs. Garcia is not here to help to demonstrate the dance, you will be taught by this DVD." He pulled a screen down the wall and tried to open the DVD player. "Thank God." He added quietly.

Troy and Gabriella stood silently as they waited for their lesson to begin.

As Coach Bolton pounded his fist on the player the screen glowed bright with two beautiful people on the screen. The coach looked very pleased with himself and settled into a nearby chair and the sports section.

"The Rumba is considered the most erotic and sensual of the Latin dances." The woman said in a dreamy voice.

"So boys," the man started. "Hold your partner as close to you as if there was a thin sheet of paper between you that could not drop.

Troy grabbed Gabriella's hand and pulled her in close. His hand slipped around her waist, pressing her body tight against his.

Gabriella slid her hand up his arm slowly up to his shoulder. Her hand squeezed tight in his as she moved her eyes up to meet his. "Don't step on my feet, Bolton."

"Don't kick me where I don't get a tan, Montez."

Those were the last words spoken between the pair.

Until 12:23 in the broom closet.

* * *

**Author's Note:** I am so _extremely_ sorry for my lack of updating. But my senior year has just started (woo!) but that means my time is being taken up by ap homework, college aps, and scholorship stuff...but I will try my best to keep the updates coming at a somewhat regular pace.

I hope people like this chapter. I know it's a little off beat but I've had the idea for the begining of this chapter in my head forever. i just had to find a place to use it.

Remember, comments are extremely loved and appreciated


	21. Trouser arouser

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 21: Trouser arouser**

It had haunted her inside and out, like an itch she couldn't scratch. Her body having to be pressed against his and the sexual tension piling up between them. It was practically unbearable, but she managed to contain herself.

That was until 12:22 when she was walking down the hallway, late to lunch.

Gabriella walked down the hallway, not realizing she was actually strutting her stuff. The want to make Troy eat his heart out took an unfortunate toll on every boy she walked by, leaving their eyes wide and their mouths open.

Much to the protest of her older brothers during free period, she had changed out of her usual jeans and sweater and into a tight jean skirt and a top that broke two rules in the school dress code. But the outfit was brought to the next level by a pair of four inch heels she had barrowed from a girl in her physics class.

Walking the hall, looking for the one boy that had made her want to do the dirty, she smiled a bright, wonderful smile.

_Gabriella sat of the counter of the bathroom sink, shoving her foot into a shoe that seemed to hate her as much as she hated it._

_"Are you sure you want to do this Gabs?" Taylor asked, leaning against the counter. "I mean, you look great. But you don't look like you."_

_Her eyes squeezed shut and she took a deep breath, "I'm not trying to look like me," her foot was still not in the shoe. "Help me Tay."_

_Gabriella stuck her leg out and Taylor jammed the shoe onto her foot. "I don't get why you can't go after him looking like youself."_

_"If I look like myself, then we will be back where we started." She said letting out a breath. One foot down. "And that's not what I'm looking for."_

_Taylor grabbed the other shoe and wedged it onto the other foot. "Not only is that stupid, but what will your brothers think?"_

_Gabriella jumped off the counter, holding her balance as she got used to her new height. "I don't plan on them finding out." She straightened what little material of skirt she had and gave herself a once over in the mirror. "And if they do, so what? I'm living my life the way I want to."_

_Taylor sighed. "Whatever you want. Just know that you have four periods of school left, plus lunch. With your luck, they're going to see you."_

_She pouted at her best friend. "I just want Troy to see me, then want me, and then…" her pout quickly turned into a smile. "You never know."_

_She rolled her eyes and pushed her out into the hallway, "You're on this one on your own."_

_Gabriella stumbled out of the bathroom landing pidgin footed in the middle of the middle of the hallway._

_With a quick look around, she straightened up and put a sour smile on her face. She had the scene all planned out in her head. It was going to be just like a movie. The ex-girlfriend would walk down the crowd parting hallway, her hips swaying and her smile sly. The ex-boyfriend then watches her walk in slow motion with his mouth open, the drool starting to drip._

_Unfortunately her plan didn't include Chad gripping her arm and yanking her into a nearby classroom. Not only did the yanking not follow the plan she had formulated in her head, but was a dangerous move considering the shoes she was now wearing. It was a good thing she liked Chad._

_"Let go of me!" she pulled herself out of his grip and flipped her hair out of her face._

_"What the hell are you thinking?" he screeched, is hair bouncing with anger._

_A slight smile grew on her face as she started to think about the end result she had hoped would come with Troy._

_"Aw gosh, Gabriella!" Chad said with a disgusted look on his face. "That's not what I meant. And this," his hand motioned to her choice of outfit. "is not the way to get Troy back."_

_"I'm not trying to get him back." She said simply. "I'm trying to make him suffer."_

_"This. Is. A. Bad. Idea." He stressed every word. "This is coming from the guy who knows you and who knows Troy."_

_Gabriella glared at him. "Nothing bad can come of this. Option one: Troy doesn't see me, but another guy might. Option two: Troy sees me and nothing happens, but another guy might see me. And the glorious option three: Troy sees me and well, whatever is supposed to happen is going happen."_

_She strutted past Chad and back into the hallway. Heads turned, jaws dropped, and a group of boys dressed in a basketball shorts stopped dead in their tracks._

_As Gabriella walked by with one hand on her hip and one hand swinging to a nonexistent beat, she prayed that she wouldn't fall. Her head turned slightly and she made eye contact with Troy. With a wink and smirk, she passed the group and continued her way down the hall._

_"Dude, your sister…" one of the boys started, his mouth drying up._

_Luke squinted his eyes shut. "Don't even start."_

_"Two words: trouser arouser"_

_Luke shoved the boy as they continued their way down the hall in the opposite direction. But one was left behind._

_Troy stood in his spot, watching Gabriella disappear into the crowd. His mouth slightly hung open when Chad appeared at his side._

_"Was that Gabriella?" he asked, his eyes not moving._

_"Yes. Yes it was." Chad answered simply._

_"And was she wearing something against the dress code?"_

_"Yes. Yes she was."_

_Troy licked his lips. "Am I an idiot?"_

_Chad nodded. "Yes. Yes you are."_

_He nodded. "Yeah, that's what I thought."_

Gabriella saw Troy standing at door of the cafeteria. The closer she got, the farther his hands moved into his jean pockets.

"I think we should talk." He said quickly. His voice fluttered with nerves.

"Follow me." she said sharply. Just as she had hoped, Troy followed.

"After the dance lesson today and then seeing you in the hall I kind of realized that it might be a good idea if we talk or something. Like, maybe we shouldn't have just broken up like that when there was, and still is, obviously still something between us even if is just physical." He was rambling, and they both knew it.

Gabriella made a sharp turn and grabbed a first full of Troy's shirt in the process. "You talk too much." She slammed the closet door shut behind them.

"What the-"

"We are officially broken up, got it? Our relationship as a couple is over."

"Than what the hell are we doing in a broom closet?" This eyes motioned to the small space that surrounded them. The same small space that the two have shared before.

Gabriella sighed at his stupidity. "You're attracted to me, I'm attracted to you. There's no reason we can't have a… physical relationship even if we don't like each other."

Troy stared down at her. The only thing that ran through his mind was how he wanted to kiss her. "Like a friends with benefits thing?"

"Oh, God no." she exclaimed. "I have no interest in being your friend. It's more like acquaintances with benefits. Get it?"

"Yeah." He let out a heavy breath.

"Good."

Gabriella grabbed the back of his head and pulled him down towards her. Her fingers wove through his wavey, golden locks and his hands crept their way around her waist to the small of her back.

His mouth was a mere whisper away from her own. The air in the tiny room began to heat up around them as their bodies pressed against each other. Both sighed heavy breaths of want; of lust.

"Are we really going to do this?" Troy asked in a voice that wasn't loud enough to even be considered a whisper.

Gabriella's eyes shifted from his chest, to his lips, and then up to the blue crystals that he claimed as his eyes. "I think it would be good idea. You know, burn some calories and all that jazz."

Troy gentle wisped his soft lips against her mouth before slammed his hands on the wall behind her. "I can't." he said, infuriated with himself.

But no one could be as upset with his as Gabriella was right then. "I did not do all of this," she motioned to her lack of clothing, "just to be in a broom closet with you and you suddenly saying you can't."

Troy sighed. "I just can't." he tried defending himself. "Not here, in a closet at school. Plus lunch ends in like ten minutes. How much fun would that be."

She silently cursed under his breath; he was right. Gabriella slumped against the wall, realizing the flaw in her once brilliant plan.

"But, that doesn't mean that us being…together still can't happen."

Her eyes slightly perked up. He wasn't willing to let her get away again; maybe her plan was still brilliant after all. "When and where, Bolton?"

He smirked. "My house, after school." He gently cupped her face and placed a sot kiss on her forehead. "See you then, Montez."

As much as his lips on her skin made Gabriella want to twirl around like a fairy with sparkles flying out from underneath her, she winced. "Rule number one: no coupley type actions. I.E. kissing my forehead, hand, nose, or hair."

Troy nodded, only slightly reluctant. "No coupley type actions." He repeated. "I guess you'll be walking home afterwards seeing as me giving you a ride would probably be considered coupley."

There was no doubt about it that Troy Bolton was good, very good.

**&**

Gabriella took the city bus home. A group of teenaged boys sat a few rows in front of her, but they kept looking back and chuckling the way that boys do. She figured she must of looked like a hot mess. But really, it wasn't her fault. If there had been time, she would have complied herself like a nomal human being.

She gazed out the dirty window and stared blankly at the passing scenery. It's not like she hasn't done it before, she had ridden the bus dozens of times. But this was the first time she had taken the bus home after having a very sexual meeting with her ex-boyfriend that had gotten her all hot and bothered. She couldn't tell which one she seemed to be more of at that moment.

Not to say that she didn't enjoy said meeting, but both of them had overlooked the fact that Troy was no longer the only child living in his house. And that the other child was a rather nosey one.

_Troy was shirtless and Gabriella's own shirt was very close to joining his on the floor when a door slammed beneath them and a pair of footsteps trotted up the stairs, thankfully, at a slow pace._

_The two had been connected at the mouth for the past twenty minutes and were both very eager to move on to the next step of their little meeting when they ripped apart from each other._

_"Angie…" they muttered together._

_Gabriella looked up at Troy. He was positioned skillfully on top of her, his chest taunting her with its touchablity. "I thought you said you were going to be home alone."_

_"Sorry." He muttered in a hoarse voice, his eyes roamed down to the sweater he had been unbuttoning. She grabbed his chin and forced his gaze to her face. "so I forgot she lived here for a minute. Could you blame me?"_

_She groaned and pushing him off of her and onto the floor. "I can't believe you." She said under her breath._

_"I'm sorry." His tone was anything but sorry. "But after seeing you in school all half naked and dragging me into the closet kind of fogged my common sense for a little bit. And then you show up here in normal clothes, but still looking sexy as hell…" his voice trailed off. "What was I supposed to do?"_

_"You're supposed to realize that the bra's and thongs sitting on the top of the laundry basket in the hallway don't belong to your mom or any of the sluts you've fooled around with." She shoved on her tennis shoes and buttoned up her shirt._

_"Contrary to your belief the last person I've slept with is you!" he stretched his whispered as loud as it could go._

_Gabriella's hard stare softened as she heard that his rebound for her was, well, her._

_"Trooooooooooooy." A knock came from the other side of the door. "I really need to talk to you."_

_Troy and Gabriella dashed for the window. "Just reach for that branch and then climb down the tree." He told her as another knock sounded in his room. She nodded and started to crawl for the tree when Troy grabbed her arm. He spun her around and pressed a kiss against her lips. "Until next time."_

* * *

**Author's Note: Updated with twists and turns, oh my :) Obviously comments are so much appreciated!! I want to know what you guys think or if you have ideas or anything at all. Just let me know!**


	22. How 101 Dalmatians of you

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 22: How 101 Dalmatians of you **

Gabriella lay in Troy's bed fingering the blue sheets that covered her. She listened to his shower run on the other side of the wall. Part of her wanted to join him in the shower. The thought of hot water dripping down his toned body could only be surpassed by the thought of her body joining his.

But the other part, the part that won, decided to stay in the bed. She looked around the room only to realize that she hadn't ever been in it when they were officially together. The walls were blue, the curtains were red, and it bled Wildcat pride. In general, it was clean, other than the clothes that were shed earlier that day.

"Hello, Gabriella?"

She snapped out of the trance she had apparently been in. "What?" she asked quickly, spinning her head around to see him. He was wearing only a low riding, white towel with water spots still shining on his chest.

"You were just like, out there." He said.

"I've just never really been in your room before, I was just looking."

He smirked and sauntered over to her, daring the towel to fall. "Wouldn't you rather occupy your time doing something much more interesting?"

She smiled and sat up, keeping the sheet over her body. "Like, what?"

Troy sat down on the bed and kissed her sharply, catching her breath. "Like that."

He leaned in again, but she pulled back. "Sorry Bolton, but I have to get going if I want to make it home by curfew."

Troy groaned and crawled behind her, pressing his lips against her neck. "Why don't you call home." He moved his mouth gently to the other side. "And tell them you are with Taylor." His mouth moved its way up her neck. "And spend the night."

As hard as it was, Gabriella pulled away. "No sleepovers." She stated simply. With the sheet clutched around her, she jumped off the bed grabbed her clothes and headed into the bathroom.

He leaned back and put him arms behind his head. "That's right. You're silly little rules." Troy rolled his eyes. "Remind me of them again."

Gabriella appeared again with a sweatshirt and sweats covering her. "No sleepovers, no PDA, no anything at school, no rides home, and no meaningful conversations."

"I really don't get that last one."

"We're not friends Troy." She reminded him. "We're just…"

"Bed buddies?" he suggested.

Her eyes narrowed. "If you want to put it like that, then yeah. That's what we are." She grabbed her bag and slung it over her shoulder. "Is anyone downstairs?"

He crossed his arms, defining his arms. "I don't know, guess you'll just have to find out."

Gabriella ignored his gleaming muscles and smirking smile that drove her wild. "I'll see you tomorrow." Her hair flung over her shoulder.

Carefully she moved through the hallway avoiding the other three people that occupied the house, when a hand encircled her arm. She spun around and was met by Troy's mouth on her own. She couldn't help but melt. Her lips gently parted letting his tongue enter and explore every corner of her mouth. He soothingly danced along her own tongue, causing her to let out a light moan of pleasure. As her hands traced the lines on his stomach and worked their way up his chest, he lightly pulled apart.

"I think Angie is on a date with your brother in the living room." He whispered in a hoarse voice. "I would suggest going out the back door."

Gabriella leaned up and kissed him once more. "You just earned yourself a special treat."

"When and wear, Montez."

She smirked and turned and away from him, heading down the back staircase. As she reached the back door, she glanced to the living room and saw her brother and Angie entangled on the couch, "Gross…" she muttered.

Five minutes late she climbed onto the blue bus and took the seat she had been sitting in for the past few weeks, her usual seat by the window. Gabriella knew the twenty minutes ride back to her house by heart. So when the bus stopped ten seconds after it started to roll, she took notice.

"Thanks man, I would have totally missed curfew if it wasn't for you."

Gabriella gaped as she watched her little brother talk to the bus driver. As Kevin started to move to the back of the bus, she slid down in her seat trying to think of a way she could get off at the same stop and go into the same house at the same time without getting noticed.

"Gabs?"

She immediately stopped planning and tried to stop blushing. "Hey Kev…what brings you here?"

"I had a date with Angie." He slid into the seat next to her. "What are you doing here? We're you on a date?"

"No," she said truthfully, but he didn't believe her. "Do you really think I would go on a date dressed like this?"

Kevin nodded his head. "Good point. So were you at the library or something?"

Her eyes lit up as her alibi was served to her on a silver platter. "Yeah. I just wanted to get some studding done in peace and quiet."

Kevin nodded, believing her story. She sighed in relief and slumped back in her chair, at least one brother believed her.

The two siblings walked into the house just minutes before curfew.

"You've sure been staying out late." Luke said as she went into the kitchen.

"See ya!" Kevin grabbed an apple and left the room as quickly as possible.

Gabriella glared at her younger brother as her older brother glared at her.

"Well," Cole said, his arms crossed his chest. "What do you have to say for yourself?"

"I have to say that finals are coming up in two weeks." She snapped back. "And unlike you two, I actually care about my grades."

"B. S." Luke said boldly.

She stared up at them. "Like I care what you guys think." She rolled her eyes. "I know where I was and that's all that matters." She turned on her heel and went up to her room.

Gabriella didn't even have a minute to herself before a someone pounded on her door.

"Oh my gosh, what?" she ripped open her door. "Oh, it's you."

Scott sauntered into her room. "What's got your undies in a bunch?"

"Life. Now what do you want?"

He picked up a stuffed animal and tossed it around in his hands. "Mom says that since you missed chores yesterday that you have to walk Sarah."

"Fine."

"Yeah, you have to walk her for a few hours."

Gabriella sighed. "There went my Sunday."

Scott nodded. "Yeah. I wanted to be the one to tell you the good new."

She smiled up at her brother. "Why thank you. And let me tell you, the day that mom and dad finally kick you guys out will be a good, good day."

**&**

Gabriella huddled around her Calculus book on the couch in the school library. It was her favorite spot in the school, maybe even in the whole city.

She laughed quietly to herself. Her favorite place in the whole city was Troy's bedroom, but that was knowledge she would only share with herself.

"What's so funny?" a sultry voice asked from behind her. "Thinking about my free throws again? Because I've been getting better; maybe I could show you sometime."

"You're breaking the rules." She muttered as she stared down the equations.

"Come on, it's been over a week." He leaned in close to her and kissed her lightly on the neck. "And I've been meaning to talk to you about those rules."

Gabriella shut her book and whipped her head around violently, giving Troy a mouthful of her hair. "Troy! We are at school, why are you even talking to me? We are not friends."

"Gabs, of course we're friends. You can't be as close as us without being friends."

She glared at him. "Fine, we're friends. And as a friend, I'm asking you to go away."

Troy jumped over the back of the couch and sat next to her. "I don't think so."

"Obviously."

"Look, we've been doing this for two months. And there are only two weeks of school left. And I've been thinking,"

"Shocking." She said under her breath.

"Maybe we should take our relationship to the next level." He suggested.

She turned to look at him. "Is my memory not working or did we not just move from acquaintances with benefits to friends with benefits?"

"That's not what I mean." He started to say.

"Look," she ignored what he had to say. "It's been great, really great. But you and I both know that a real relationship is nearly impossible. We're both too stubborn and too different and too opinionated to converse with each other on another, higher level."

Troy sighed and tried to rebut her comment.

"And look, I think there's another rule that we should add to the list." She added quickly.

"It's your list." Troy said.

Gabriella ignored his comment. "If either one of us decides to, you know, move on with another person then we should support each other and leave the current situation as is. Or leave it as not…"

His mouth fell. "What the hell does that mean?" his face turned a shade of dark red. "Have you been seeing someone else? Are you sneaking around behind my back?"

"There is no behind your back since we aren't dating." She spat back. "And what are you so upset about? You were thrilled with this idea in the closet."

"I was thrilled to be with you, Gabriella. Any way I could."

"Then you shouldn't have broken up with me through a damn note! God," she slumped back into the couch. "Why are you so complicated?"

"Me? You are the one who bottles everything up. If that doesn't scream complicated, then I don't know what does."

"See!" she exclaimed. "This is also why we can't be together. Too much arguing and too much drama."

"There's drama because there is history." He said sharply.

"History means there's past, not a future."

"History means loyalty, devotion."

She was ready to retort when another voice cut her off.

"Gabriella, you ready to go?"

Both turned to see another boy hovering over them.

Gabriella quickly stood up and straightened out her shirt and grabbed her book. "Yeah, I'm ready." She grabbed his arm and turned away from Troy.

"Not going to introduce me to your friend, Gabriella? That's not very polite."

She stopped in her tracks and turned around slowly. "Troy, this is my friend Ethan. Ethan this is my friend Troy."

"Ethan," Troy looked him over. "She's never mentioned you. And we spend a lot of time together."

"We just met a little over a week ago." Ethan explained. "I doubt I've made that big of an impression on her life yet."

Troy nodded slowly. "So how did you two meet? Physics club?"

"I was walking Sarah and Ethan was walking his dog, Sam. We kind of ran into each other and got tangled up in the leashes."

Troy made an awing sound. "How 101 Dalmatians of you."

Gabriella glared at him. "Very. Now we have a study date. So if you don't mind…"

"Go ahead. Don't let me stop you."

"I never will." She turned her attention back to Ethan. "Sorry about that. Troy doesn't really know when to butt out."

"Thanks ok." He shot her a gleaming smile. "Just as long as you're still leaving with me."

She smiled and stared up at him with him looking down at her. Ethan gently grabbed her books from her arms as they walked out the door.

Troy watched them walk out of the library. With a slight smirk on his face, a plan formulated in his head. Not only would he have to get Gabriella back in his arms, but also he would have to get her away from the surfer boy she had seemed to recently latch herself onto. And he knew exactly how he was going to do it.

* * *

**Author's Note: A chapter for you that I am very pelased with :) I don't know why, but I really like this one (maybe because I know what's coming up next, teehee).**

**Anyways, my usual plee is here: please comment! I love all comments. Good, bad, indifferent, they are all fantastic! (leave one, pretty please?)**

**And be ready for a shocker coming up next chapter (as if Gabriella finding a new guy isn't shocker enough for ya). I think (well, hope) I'll get most of your jaws on the floor next time. If I don't then I'm not as mysterious as I thought (and this little spcheel probably isn't helping, lol).**


	23. One for the books

**Life in a Glass House**

**Chapter 23: One for the books**

Gabriella dropped her back pack onto the couch, "Summer is here!" she exclaimed, twirling around in her sun dress.

Kevin ducked under her spinning arms. "Watch it sis. I can't have you decapitate me, the whole summer is ahead of us."

She giggled and dropped onto the couch next to her two youngest brothers, "How was your last day of school?"

"Too long." Ian gripped."

"So much fun!" Jason exclaimed. "I can't wait until next year."

"You are definitely my brother." She said with a smile.

Kevin jumped over back of the couch and sat on the other side of them. "Yeah because he definitely isn't mine. Summer is never long enough."

"Last year you had it easy." She told him. "This year, you're on the job with us."

Kevin stretched out on the couch. "Working at Uncle Robert's country club? Like that job is going to be so hard."

Gabriella's mom hustled into the living room, "Oh good, you all are home. Stay right there."

A minute later the four older boys dropped next to their family on the couch.

"You guys reek." She couched, taking in the smell of her brothers.

"Sorry, you know with no more school all we have to do is play basketball." Luke said, putting his arm around Gabriella.

"But you two wont know that feeling for a while now." Cole added. "Seeing as you'll be back at good old East High come September."

Gabriella grabbed her brother's arm and pulled it off of her shoulders. "How you two graduated is beyond me."

"Okay everybody, quiet down." Her mom called.

Both her parents stood in the middle of the room with the kids sitting around them.

"Oh boys, you all need a shower." Her mom noted.

"They're boys, let them be dirty." Her dad said. "And the reason why we called this meeting…"

"Summer at Lava Springs." The eight kids said in unison.

"Yes," he nodded. "Now this year Kevin is old enough to join the staff and bunk out at the club." Kevin pumped his fist in the air.

Scott chuckled. "It aint all fun and games Kev."

"It's a full time job." Trevor told him. "Nine to five in the sun and bunking with the other staffers."

The front door burst open, "Sorry we're late!" Chad yelled, jumping onto the couch with Taylor in tow. "Did we miss anything important."

"Not at all," her mom said. "We were just about to pick jobs."

Their dad fanned out a stack of index cards in his hand. "Robert has added some new jobs for you all to try this summer seeing as there have been some additions to the club and hotel this year."

As each kid dove for their mystery card their mom continued. "Now there's a very nice outdoor pool, basketball court, tennis court, recreation center for the kids, and the hotel lobby has expanded."

"So pretty much everything the Evans don't own has expanded." Gabriella noted. "And I got lifeguard!" She grinned. "Hello sun kissed tan."

"I got the sports center." Cole smiled.

"I'm a freaking bus boy!" Kevin's eyes were wide. "I have to hang out in the restaurant all day?"

"And you have to clean the tables." Luke chuckled. "And I got…Snack Shack." His face fell. "I would rather have bus boy.

"Really?" Kevin's eyes perked up. "Want to trade?"

Luke looked his brother over, "Ah, never mind. Snack Shack is better than bus boy."

"Front desk." Trevor announced. "I'll take it."

"Waiter." Chad slightly smiled, "Third year running."

Taylor opened her card. "Recreation Center." She grinned. "Anything is better than being on kitchen staff like last year."

"Let's hope I didn't get kitchen staff." Scott dramatically opened his card. "Gofer." He stated, reading the card. "I'm a gofer."

"I'll trade you!" Kevin offered quickly.

Scott shook his head. "Even a gofer is better than a bus boy." The room filled with chuckles.

"Hey Dad, what's with the extra card? Ian and Jason taking on a job?"

The boys' faces lit up, "Are we Dad?" they asked in sync.

He shook his head. "Sorry boys. You two are still going to summer camp. This card is for someone else who will be joining you this summer."

"Like always, Chad and Taylor will be joining you at the club. But a few friends of ours are going out of the country this summer and asked us if we could watch their son." Her mom started. "And since he's the same age as all of you, we decided to get him a job at Lava Springs as well."

"Who is he?" Gabriella asked excitedly.

"Why do you care?" Kevin spat. "You're already with that Ethan kid."

Her eyes narrowed on her brother. "I'm not dating him."

"Not yet." he said simply.

"Who's Ethan?" he dad questioned. "And you know you're not supposed to date anyone unless your mother and I approve."

"I'm not dating him." She stated.

"Not yet." Kevin repeated.

Gabriella was ready to leap across the couch and pummel her brother when the doorbell rang.

"There he is!" her mother exclaimed. She quickly made her way to the door. "Come on in sweetheart."

Everyone on the couch turned around to see the mystery worker come into the house.

Gabriella stared with an open mouth and wide eyes.

"Troy!" Chad exclaimed. He jumped off the couch and ran to his friend. "Why didn't you tell me you were working with us this summer?"

Troy smirked and looked at Gabriella. "I wanted it to be a surprise."

She locked eyes with him. "Well, you definitely succeeded." She muttered.

"Hell yeah!" Luke jumped over the couch and stood next to Troy. "This is officially the best summer."

Gabriella turned back around and slid down the back of the couch. "One for the books; that's for sure."

**&**

Gabriella stared as the pile of bags in on her bed. There were many bags, but only one her. A problem she faced with ease.

"Ian! Jason!" she hollered out her bedroom door. "Can you guys come here?"

A minutes later her two littlest brothers ran into her room and immediately laid eyes on her bed.

"Gabriella," Ian gripped. "We are not your pack mules."

"And I never said you were." She smiled at them, "But you two are my little brothers, which means that you get to help me carry my bags."

"And what's in it for us?" Jason asked.

Gabriella's smile faded, "The joy of helping your sister save her back?" They both looked unimpressed. "A dollar?"

"We aren't five."

"Just help me." She spat. "And I'll get Mom and Dad to consider letting you two come to the club for a week."

The boys smiled and dove for her bags.

Gabriella followed them out to the car with a smirk on her face carrying only her backpack.

Luke stood next to her watching the young boys load her bags into the car. "How did you get them to carry all of your stuff?" he questioned.

"I'm just good like that."

"You promised them something that you wont get them, didn't you?"

"Maybe." She watched them pile her last bag into the back of the car. "Thanks guys, I will totally talk to Mom and Dad as soon as I can."

The two young boys high fived each other and ran back into the house.

"You're horrible." Luke stated.

"Oh shut up. We all do it." She hit his shoulder with her own as she walked back into the house for the last time that summer. Sarah ran up to her; Gabriella kneeled down and rubbed her head. "I'm going to miss you girl. But they'll take good care of you. They always do."

"Now only if you could show the same affection to an actual person."

Gabriella pushed off the floor and spun around. "What the heck is that supposed to mean?"

Troy stared down at her. "You know exactly what it means."

She put her hands on her hips and stared back at him. "What are you even doing here Bolton?"

"I'm working at Lava Springs for the summer." He said with a smile. "Contrary to your belief I'm not going there to follow your every move. I've moved on."

"Really? Then how come I don't see you with a girl on you arm?"

"Just because I choose not to flaunt my fling doesn't mean that I haven't moved on."

Her eyes narrowed, "What makes you think Ethan is just a fling."

"What makes you think I was talking about Ethan?"

He had her, and she hated it. "So what, is Angie staying home alone all summer?" she asked, changing the subject.

"Actually she's gone. She got caught sneaking out with my dad's car and Coach sent her back to her parents, who sent her off to some year long boarding school. And in the process of all this she broke up with Kevin…" his voice trailed off as Gabriella spun around and left him alone. "And now you're gone."

She ran up the stairs and into her brother's room. "Kevin," she said lightly. "How are you doing?"

He looked at her curiously, shoving clothes into a duffle bag. "Fine…why?"

"You and Angie broke up."

He looked back down at his bag. "Oh, yeah. Like a week ago."

She walked up next to him. "Why didn't you tell anyone?"

Kevin sighed. "I guess I was embarrassed. She left because she's one step away from juvy."

"My ex-boyfriend gave me ruffies after I broke up with Troy." She told him softly. "You have nothing to be embarrassed about. Especially in front of me."

"Do you ever think I'll find someone else as good as her?"

Gabriella smiled. "Seeing as how she stole a car and she doesn't have license, I think you'll do much better."

Kevin grinned, "Thanks sis."

Proud of herself, she left him room and saw Troy standing where she left him. "Why are you still standing there?"

"I was kind of in the middle of a sentence when you just up and left."

She rolled her eyes and brushed past him. "I had to talk to Kevin. It was his first big break up and I thought he might want to talk about it a little."

"Yeah, because guys are so gung-ho to talk about their feelings."

"You certainly are."

"Well, I'm,"

She spun around, causing him to crash into her. "Different? Special? Unique? One of a kind?" she asked. "Look, just because you're going to be around this summer doesn't mean that something is going to happen."

Troy stood there, nodding his head.

"I mean, we are done with the benefits thing."

He continued to nod his head.

"I really like Ethan and I don't want to screw things up with him."

He nodded again, with a smirk.

"Okay, bad use of words. But you catch my drift."

"I get what you're laying down, Montez." He mocked her. "And I won't do anything to come in between the epic love of you and Erwin."

"Ethan." She spat.

Tory shrugged. "It's all the same in the end." As he started to walk away, he turned back around to face her. "I'm a golf caddy by the way."

She watched him walk away, not realizing that Taylor was now by her side.

"If there was ever an epic love in your life, it's Troy." She said as they watched him get into the car with Chad.

Gabriella sighed. "If by some odd miracle you're right, I'll let you One Tree Hill reference me all you want." She strode to her brother's car and jumped inside.

Taylor followed with a smirk. "I have a feeling that this summer with the rebirth of Troyella."

**&**

Gabriella sat in the car that was weighed down by a dozen duffle bags and five members of the Montez family. She watched the scenery zoom by as they made their way to Lava Springs. Her mind spun with thought of the summer that lay ahead of her. With a new job, old friends, and an ex-boyfriend it was sure to be a summer that she wouldn't soon forget. And even if it was, there was no way her brothers would ever let her.

**TO BE CONTINUED...**

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**Author's Note (PLEASE READ THE WHOLE THING :))**

Well, that was the big surpise! It's the end of this story** (please don't hate me).** I always wanted to end this with a little cliff hanger because I've always planned on writing a sequal. **But the sequal wont be coming around until the start of the new year at least.** I need a break from these characters and I need to get back on myself about finishing up _Somewhere A Click Is Ticking_ sometime soon.

I will give you a sneak of the sequal to keep ya'll occupied

**Lifetime Piling Up** (title will not change)

Name: _Gabriella Montez_

Age: _17_

Dating: _Yes…No…Who really knows these days?_

Status: _Living at Lava Springs for three months and lifeguarding five days a week._

Ambitions: _1) To pay Troy Bolton no attention, even though he lives in the bungalow next door and works 18 holes that are in perfect view of the pool. 2) To get her brothers to focus on work instead of the young female hotel guests. 3) Aren't one and two enough to keep a girl busy?_

The Story: _After a year of Calculus, brothers and basketball games Gabriella Montez has realized one thing: Troy Bolton is either destined to be the love of her life or fate is playing a cruel trick on her. First, she reluctantly ended up spending too much time with him and caused her brothers and friends to wonder if a romance had began to grow. Then it did. There was no denying a budding relationship between the two stubborn Wildcats._

_But then it stopped when he rescued her from the worst situation a young girl can get into and left her a note asking for a break up. If that is not enough to make her head spin, the two couldn't keep their hands off each other and started a less than romantic relationship that could only have been broken up by a new guy._

_With their relationship practically estranged and a green eyed monster sitting on both of their shoulders, the summer is already proving to more eventful than fifty nights at a hotel during the state championships. And Troy managed snagged a job fifty yards away from Gabriella. Oh how that fates love their little games._

So, I hope you all are excited for the new story. I know I am ;)

**HSM**

Now, here's where I need your help. Not only do I need/want your opinion on this chapter (yes, **comments are still loved**) but I need everyone's help on deciding on my new story to post. I've started seven new ones and have narrowed it down to four that i really like. **So if you could please leave a comment with the one or two that you would most like to read, it would help me out so much**. Here are previews of each story for everyone to read:

**&**

**Sadie Hawkins Dance**

**-**title will not change

- K+ (maybe Teen later on)

-Humor/Romance

_How did this happen? Really, it's a loss even to Gabriella who happens to be in the center of it. She spent the last few months convincing herself that she was over her crush on Troy. And it was actually happened, she was actually getting over him. Then why is she taking him to the Sadie Hawkins Dance? And why is he looking at her in a way that makes her wish that she picked a costume that covered up more skin? The night has barely started and she already wishes it would just be over. The last thing Gabriella wants is for her crush to come back, but now she is wondering if it ever left in the first place._

**&**

**The Story of a Girl**

-title probably wont change

- most likely Teen

-humor/Romance/Drama

_Yeah, so my name is Gabriella and to put it short: I'm a nerd. I liked high school, I went to the dances with my friends and have never had a serious boyfriend; unless you count me having Troy Bolton as a boyfriend in my dreams. You'd think that going off to college would kill a crush, right? Well, wrong. Not when your crush goes to the same school. And not when your crush magically ends up in your room. And not when you start to actually become friends with him. On no, by then the crush is very much still alive. How am I supposed to be friends with Troy when all I want to do is rip his clothes off with my teeth and have my way with him? They always say that your freshman year is the hardest…_

**&**

**Better In Time**

-Title could change

-K, K, Teen... I have no diea yet, lol

-Drama/Romance/Tragedy

_The Montezs and the Boltons were thrown together after a tragic accident befell the two families. They have managed to survive over a year of living together and have become their own version of a family. But as the oldest is gone to college, Troy and Gabriella are now the only things close to an adult in the house. The world sees them as a married couple with five kids to look after. But the see each other as just Troy and Gabriella, the only shoulder to cry on and the only one who gets it. But their senior year at East High has it's surprises that will catch the whole family off guard._

The two never paid much attention to each other. But after one horrible day, they have found a comfort in each other that couldn't have ever been foreseen.

**&**

**Brave New World**

-title could change

-K+ probably

-Drama/Tragedy/Romance/Humor

_It would probably be an understatement to say that Troy and Gabriella hated each other. But after the accident Troy is feeling things that he shouldn't feel towards his worst enemy. And Gabriella is trying to figure out why she hated Troy so much when he is possible the sweetest guy she has ever met. Troy doesn't know what's wrong with Gabriella, but he likes it. A lot. And you don't hear Gabriella complaining either._

**HSM**

Wow, I know most of thosesound weird and complicated (probably because they are, lol) but **they will get better **than the sneak peaks I posted. I origonally wanted to post the first chapter of each story, but that made this well over 5,000 words. And asking you guys to read all that is too much to ask (even though ya'll are awesome and i bet you could do it).

So all in all I have 4 questions for my readers:

**1) Did you like _Life in a Glss House_? the ending? Do you hate me for ending it this way?**

**2) Are you excited for _Lifetime Piling Up_ coming 2009? Will you wait that long for it?**

**3) Which one/two sneak speaks do you like best? Want a dramatic heart wrencher or a comedic mouth dropper?**

**4) Any other comments or questions? About this story? My new stories? Me? Ask away if you even have the tiniest question on anything.**


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